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THE 



POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 
PRECEDING THE REBELLION 



THE TRUE STORIES OF SUMTER 
AND PICKENS 



THOMAS M. ANDERSON 

\ 

LIEUT. COL. U. S. A. 



G 



NEW YORK 
P. PUTNAM'S SONS 

27 * 29 WEST 23D STREET 
1882 






COPYRIGHT BY 

G. P. PUTNAM'S SONS 
1882 



BT 



DEDICATION 



TO THE OLD FRIENDS OF 

GENERAL ROBERT ANDERSON 

THIS MONOGRAPH IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED BY 
THE AUTHOR 



CHAPTER I. 

' ' O Conspiracy ! 
Sham'st thou to show thy dangerous brow by night, 
When evils are most free ? Oh ! then, by day 
Where wilt thou find a cavern dark enough 
To mask thy monstrous visage ? Seek none, Conspiracy ; 
Hide it in smiles and affability : 
For if thou put thy native semblance on. 
Not Erebus itself were dim enough 
To hide thee from prevention." 

Julius CiESAR. 

I PURPOSE in this monograph to give an 
account of the political conspiracies immedi- 
ately preceding the Rebellion of 1861 against 
the authority of the National Government of the 
United States of America. 

It would be absurd to assume that one of 
the greatest civil wars of modern times was the 
result of conspiracies. 

The causes which led to it were far too deep 
and strong to be controlled by the machinations 
of politicians. 

Nevertheless the outbreak of the Rebellion 
was preceded by a number of conspiracies the 
object of which, so far as the Southern leaders 
were concerned, was to gain certain advantages 



2 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

by cunning 2S\A finesse before they resorted to 
the arbitrament of war. 

These plots are naturally connected with the 
sieges of Forts Sumter and Pickens, with which 
the struggle began. 

In regard to the mere physical facts of the 
siege of Sumter there is no mystery or dispute. 
But as to the political history which gives it im- 
portance, as to the complications which cul- 
minated in the first passage at arms in the war, 
there has been almost as much discussion as 
there has been as to the guilt or innocence of 
Mary of Scotland. 

What pledges, if any, did Mr. Buchanan give 
to the South Carolina Commissioners ? 

What understanding, if any, did he have with 
Messrs. Barnwell, Adams, and Orr as to the re- 
enforcement or evacuation of the forts in Charles- 
ton Harbor? 

What pledges, if any, did Mr. Seward subse- 
quently give in relation to Sumter ? 

Was Major Robert Anderson, its commander, 
deterred by orders or by his sympathy with the 
South from opening fire on the Confederates 
when they began placing batteries around him ? 

All these questions have been mooted and 
discussed heretofore with much less intellieence 
than zeal. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION, 3 

Now at last the publication of the official 
records gives us a fair, critical, and historical 
standpoint. 

After the October elections in the fall of 1 860 
had been carried by the Republicans, the elec- 
tion of Mr. Lincoln in November became a 
foregone conclusion. Knowing this, the people 
of South Carolina took no pains to conceal their 
intention of seceding from the Federal Union as 
soon as the result of the Presidential election 
was known. As the day of the election ap- 
proached, the people of Charleston manifested 
such a turbulent and rebellious spirit, that the 
engineer officer in charge of the construction 
parties working on the forts in the harbor asked 
for permission to arm a number of his workmen 
to protect the ordnance and ammunition stored 
in Fort Sumter. 

On the I St of October (i860) the Chief of 
Ordnance wrote to Mr. Floyd, the Secretary 
of War, recommending that the request of the 
engineer officer be complied with, provided it 
met the approval of the commanding officer of 
Fort Moultrie. Singularly enough Mr. Floyd 
approved this application. 

The commanding officer of Fort Moultrie, 
when the matter was referred to him, gave a 
very hesitating approval of the application, ex- 



4 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

pressing grave doubts of the loyalty and relia- 
bility of the workmen engaged on the forts, 
and closed his letter (written November 8th) 
by a recommendation that the garrison of Moul- 
trie should be re-enforced, and that both Forts 
Sumter and Castle Pinckney should be garri- 
soned at once by companies sent from Old Point 
Comfort (Fort Monroe). Subsequently he or- 
dered the ordnance officer at the Charleston 
Arsenal to turn over to him, for removal to Moul- 
trie, all the small arms and fixed ammunition he 
had in store. The attempt to make this trans- 
fer was successfully resisted by the Charleston 
mob, and the attempt abandoned. 

This action of the commander of the troops 
in the harbor, and his application for re-enforce- 
ments, led to his prompt removal. The officer 
thus summarily dealt with was Lieut. Colonel 
J. L. Gardner, ist Artillery, a native of Massa- 
chusetts, and an old veteran who had entered 
the service in 1813. The South Carolina Com- 
missioners, in their correspondence with Presi- 
dent Buchanan, reminded him, with scant cour- 
tesy, that Colonel Gardner had been removed 
at the dictation of the South Carolina delegates, 
because he had called for re-enforcements and 
recommended the occupation of Fort Sumter 
and Castle Pinckney. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 5 

Major Robert Anderson was ordered to re- 
lieve this officer and take command of Fort 
Moultrie on November i5, i860. 

If the Southern cabal that controlled the 
War Department supposed that he would prove 
more pliant and less loyal than his predecessor 
they soon discovered their mistake. 

Robert Anderson was born in Kentucky in 
i8o5. Both his father's and mother's family 
came from England to Virginia in 1635, and 
removed from Virginia to Kentucky at the close 
of the War of Independence.' 

Eight of his blood relations were officers in 
the Continental Army. His father, the Lieut- 
Colonel of the I St Virginia Continental Infantry, 
had been wounded at the battles of Trenton and 
Savannah, and, singularly enough, had fought at 
Charleston and had been taken prisoner there 
by the British. 

He subsequently acted as A. D. C. to General 
Lafayette in his campaign against Corn wallis that 
ended in the siege and capture of Yorktowno 

At the close of the Revolutionary War he 

' Major Anderson's relatives in the Continental Army were : R. C. 
Anderson, Lieut. -Col. 1st Va. ; Capt. John Anderson, 3d Va. Inft.; 
Capt. Wm. Croghan, 4th Va. Inft.; Capt. John Marshall, 7th Va. 
Inft. (afterward Chief-Justice U. S.) ; Brig.-Genl. George Rodger 
Clark; Lieut. -Col. Jonathan Clark, 8th Va. Inft.; Capt. Geo. An- 
derson, provisional navy. 

The members of his family who were officers of the Regular and 
Volunteer forces, during the war of the Rebellion were as follows : 



O POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

was selected by the officers of the Continental 
Army to survey and locate the generous gift of 
public land given to them by the State of Vir- 
ginia. This selection was, I believe, made at 
the first meeting of the Society of the Cincin- 
nati. That he might carry out this work, he 
was made first Surveyor-General of the Virginia 
military land district. 

This present of land was all that the Conti- 
nental officers received for their seven years' 
service in the war for independence. In pro- 
posing one of their number to apportion to each 
his distributive share, they naturally selected a 
man in whose integrity and justice they had 
perfect confidence. 

This high sense of honor Major Anderson 
inherited from his father. A more honest, 
honorable, and chivalrous man never lived. 
He was a Southerner,' and in a proper sense 

Brig.-Genl. Robert Anderson ; Col. Chas. Anderson, 63d Ohio 
Vol. (subsequently Governor of .Ohio) ; Col. N. L. Anderson, 6th 
Ohio Vol.; Col. A. L. Anderson, ist Cal. Vol.; Capt. Wm. P. 
Anderson, 6th Ohio Vol. (A. A. G. Dept. of Ohio) ; Capt, E. L. An- 
derson, A. D. C; Maj.-Genl. Stanley ; Capt. F. P. Anderson, A. D. 
C. ; Maj.-Genl. Schofield ; Capt. H. R. Anderson, 3d U. S. Vol.; 
Major John Simpson, 154th Ind. Vol.; Lieut. -Col. Thomas M. An- 
derson of the Regular Army ; Surg. Richard Logan, Ky. Vol., U. 
S. A. 

' The following are the more prominent officers of our army and navy 
who, although Southerners by birth, remained faithful to the National 
Government. 

In the Army: Winfield Scott, Geo. H. Thomas, Ord, Pope, 
Rosseau, Meigs, Harney, Frank Blair, Buchanan, Buford, Bayard, 
R. H, Williams, McKeever, Jos. Taylor, J as. Marten, Easton, 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 7 

was a Southern sympathizer. He loved his 
State and he loved his friends, and, from acci- 
dental associations, most of his friends were 
Southerners. But few men ever lived who came 
so near having no political opinions and sympa- 
thies whatever. He probably never voted in his 
life. He used to say that his father's religion 
and General Washington's politics were good 
enough for him. The Ten Commandments, 
the Constitution of the United States, and the 
Army Regulations were his guides in life. For 
the subject of this essay, for the political prob- 
lem which his conduct subsequently brought to 
the test of practical solution, he cared as little 
as any man of his day. 

He was sincerely religious and a soldier of 
antique character and courage. Above all, he 
was a follower of his flag. To him it was like 
a sacrament, an outward sign of an inward grace. 
It was his symbol of duty. He always saw upon 
its folds " In hoc signo vinces." 

In the war that followed, eleven of his immedi- 

Tompkins, Murray, Cuyler, Simons, Wm. Hammond, J. F. Ham- 
mond, Newton, Benit,, Laidley, Baylor, Davidson, Royall, E. B. 
Alexander, A. J, Alexander, Dent, Getty, T. L. Crittenden, Marrow, 
Elwell Otis, Lugenbeel, Dodge, Sprig, Carroll, Cooke, Ramsey, Holt, 
Brice, T. J. Wood, Emery, Paul, Mcintosh, R. W. Johnson Lang, 
Seawell, Hunter, French, Graham (old Pike), Burke (old Martin). 

In the Navy : Farragut, John Rodgers, Patterson, Fairfax, Hop- 
kins, Carter, Burrett, Young, Jouett, Russell, Stribling, Powell, 
Craven, Radford, Turner, Lee, Jenkins, Sands, Steedman, Taylor, 
Scott, Stembel, Middleton, Bache, Horner, Ward, Palmer, and 
Harlan, all of high rank. 



8 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

ate family, including himself, held commissions 
in the Union Army. 

With these antecedents and influences, it 
would have been strange indeed if Robert An- 
derson had not been loyal to his country. 

Nevertheless it is true, beyond reasonable 
doubt, that the Secretary of War, when he sent 
him to take command of the forces in Charles- 
ton Harbor, fully believed that he would obey 
all his orders and finally throw his fortunes 
with the South. 

The first letter he received from Major An- 
derson after he assumed command of Moultrie, 
dated November 23, i860, must have shaken 
his faith. 

In it he explains the gravity of the situation 
and the inadequacy of his means of defence ; 
expresses the conviction that the people of 
South Carolina intended to seize all the forts in 
the harbor by force of arms as soon as their 
ordinance of secession was published ; he en- 
larges on the importance of Sumter and Castle 
Pinckney, demands reinforcements, notifies the 
War Department that he will send in a requisi- 
tion for a supply of ordnance for all the forts, 
and says, finally : " Fort Sumter and Castle 
Pinckney must be garrisoned immediately if 
the government determines to keep command 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. g 

of the harbor." The italics are his (page 76, 
vol. i, " Rebellion Records"). 

In passing through Washington City on his 
way to Charleston, Major Anderson had seen 
President Buchanan and the Secretary of War. 
By the latter at least he had been cautioned to 
avoid all collision with the people of Charleston, 
to avoid disturbance, not to excite them, and so 
on, in this strain of conciliatory weakness. His 
subsequent letters and instructions were all 
pitched in the same key. 

There is no telling what disapproval and re- 
proof Major Anderson's first letter might not 
have brought down on his head, for a much less 
decided letter had caused the removal of Col- 
onel Gardner, had not a new and unexpected 
element been introduced into the controversy. 

The venerable patriot, Lewis Cass, the Secre- 
tary of State, suddenly denounced submission 
as treasonable, and supported Major Anderson's 
demand for reinforcements. Two other mem- 
bers of the Cabinet seem to have supported Mr. 
Cass. This was a political bomb-shell, and with 
this begins the political history of the Sumter 
episode. 

To appreciate fully the situation we must re- 
call the names of the men then in power at 
Washington. 



lO POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

James Buchanan and John C. Breckenridge 
were President and Vice-President. Buchanan's 
first Cabinet were Cass, Cobb, Floyd, Toucey, 
Thompson, Holt, and Black. Jefferson Davis 
was Chairman of the Military Committee in the 
Senate. The men in control of the War De- 
partment were Floyd, Cooper, Joe Johnson, 
Taylor, Craig, De Russy, Don Carlos Buell, 
Fitz-John Porter, and Withers. 

In the Cabinet, Cobb, Floyd, Toucey, and 
Thompson were rebels or submissionists. They 
had the ear of the President. In the War De- 
partment, Floyd, Cooper, Johnson, Taylor, and 
Withers were Southerners. Taylor, Craig, and 
De Russy were loyal, but had no influence. 
Buell and Porter afterward proved loyal, but at 
that time were in Floyd's confidence, or at least 
Floyd had confidence in them. Porter, then 
Assist. Adjutant-General, made an inspection of 
the forts in Charleston Harbor a few days be- 
fore Anderson reached there. His attention 
had evidently been called to the importance of 
Castle Pinckney by Colonel Gardner, for in his 
report he says of it : 

" Castle Pinckney commands Charleston, and 
its armament is complete. Here the powder 
belonging to the arsenal in the city is stored. 
A company can be accommodated here, while a 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. II 

small force under an officer would secure it 
against surprise or even a bold attack of such 
enemies likely to undertake it." 

But he had not the moral courage to recom- 
mend its occupation. The report closes with 
this sentence and signature of evil omen : 
" Under present circumstances I would not rec- 
ommend its occupation. Very respectfully, etc., 
F.-J. Porter, Assistant Adjt.-General " (page 72, 
Ibid). 

Why not recommend it ? Oh, bitter shame 
to us ! 

Within two months we have a set of so- 
called Commissioners writing to the President 
of this nation these insulting words : 

" For the last sixty days you have had in 
Charleston Harbor not force enough to hold the 
forts against an equal enemy. Two of them 
were empty, one of those two the most impor- 
tant in the harbor ; it could have been taken at 
any time. You ought to know better than any 
man that it would have been taken but for the 
efforts of those who put their trust in your 
honor." Signed. " Barnwell, Adams, Orr." 

Thanks to this peace-at-any-price policy, this 
was an insult we had to endure. The circum- 
stance that prevented an officer of the United 
States Army from recommending the occupation 



12 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

of a United States fort, was the threat of a rebel 
mob. 

General Porter's report was written on the 
nth of November. On the 12th Mr. Humph- 
ries, the ordnance store-keeper at Charleston 
Arsenal, writes to the Chief of Ordnance : 

" Sir. — In view of the excitement now exist- 
ing in this city and State, and the possibility of 
an insurrectionary movement on the part of the 
servile population, the governor has tendered, 
through General Schnierle, of South Carolina 
Militia, a guard of a detachment of a lieutenant 
and twenty men for this post, which has been 
accepted." 

What delightful protection ! How disinter- 
ested ! The wolves offer to protect this pet 
lamb against the geese ! On the 20th, Brevet 
Colonel Benjamin Huger,' U. S. A., soon of the 
C. S. A., assumes command of the arsenal by 
order ; he writes back at once "that Mr. Humph- 
ries' prudence and discretion meet his com- 
mendation." So a wolf in sheep's clothing was 
sent down to defend the fold. 

Next in order we have a letter from S. 
Cooper, Adjutant-General, U. S. A., soon to be 

' Huger, pronounced Hugee. Benj. Huger was a graduate of the 
Military Academy in the class of 1825. He was twice brevetted for 
gallantry in battle in the Mexican war. He resigned from the Federal 
army in i36i, was made a Major-General in the Confederate army, 
and led the advance of Lee's army at the battle of Malvern Hill. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 1 3 

Adjutant-General, C S. A., asking Anderson as 
to the condition " of the work under his com- 
mand" (Fort Moultrie). 

In reply (November 28th), Major Anderson 
politely intimates that he considers himself in 
command of all the works in the harbor, and will 
put in estimates for ordnance to arm them all. 

" Your letter," he says, " confines my answer to 
what refers to the work under my charge. I can- 
not but remark that I think its security from at- 
tack would be more greatly increased by throw- 
ing garrisons into Casde Pinckney and Fort 
Sumter than by any thing that can be done in 
strengthening the defences of tliis work." Fur- 
ther on he says, in reply to the suggestion of 
the honorable Secretary of War about th ex- 
pediency of employing reliable persons not con- 
nected with the military service for purposes of 
fatigue and police, " I must say that I doubt 
whether such could be obtained here." This 
was a patriotic suggestion of the Hon. J. B. 
Floyd, who subsequently resigned his place in 
the Cabinet because President Buchanan had re- 
fused to adhere to his promise as Secretary of 
War, that the forts in Charleston Harbor should 
not be reinforced or their status changed. 

Mr. Floyd fully intended in this way to se- 
cure the forts in the harbor to the Charleston 



14 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

people. For the same reason he allowed the 
work of construction and repair to be carried on 
by the Engineers. He knew that the people of 
South Carolina had declared their intention of 
seizinsf the forts as soon as their State Conven- 
tion had passed their ordinance of secession. 
Yet with charming consistency we find him 
sending this telegram to Captain Foster of the 
Engineers : 

I have just received a telegraphic dispatch informing 
me that you have removed forty muskets from Charles- 
ton Arsenal to Fort Moultrie. If you have removed any 
arms return them insiatitly. Answer by telegraph 

John B. Floyd, 

Secretary of War, 

Colonel Huger had pledged himself to the 
Governor of South .Carolina that no arms should 
be removed from the arsenal. 

The Secretary's telegram was dated December 
19, i860, the day before the South Carolina 
ordinance of secession was passed. 

All of the occurrences above narrated were 
prior to this portentous date. 

Did President Buchanan know of these 
pledges and orders ? Did they have his con- 
currence and approval? Or did he, as Judge 
Black now asserts, wish to send reinforcements 
to Major Anderson } 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 1 5 

On December 8th, four of the members of 
the South Carolina Congressional delegation 
went to see the President about the forts in 
Charleston Harbor. On the 9th, five of them 
signed the following joint note : 

His Excellency, James Buchanan, 

President of the United States : 

In compliance with our statement to you yesterday, we 
now express to you our strong convictions that neither 
the constituted authorities, nor any body of the people of 
the State of South Carolina, will either attack or molest 
the United States forts in the harbor of Charleston pre- 
viously to the action of the Convention, and, we hope and 
believe, not until an offer has been made, through an ac- 
credited representative, to negotiate for an amicable ar- 
rangement of all matters between the State and Federal 
Government, provided that no reinforcement shall be sent 
into those forts, and their relative military status shall 
remain as at present. 

John McQueen, 
Wm. Porcher Miles, 
M. L. Bonham, 

W. W. BOYCE, 

Lawrence M. Keitt. 
Washington, December 9, i860. 

In Mr. Buchanan's letter to Barnwell, Adams, 
and Orr, the South Carolina Commissioners, 
written December 31, i860, after quoting the 
above letter and referring to the interview that 
followed, he says : " It is well known that it 



1 6 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

was my determination, and this I freely ex-, 
pressed, not to reinforce the forts in the harbor, 
and thus produce a coUision, until they had been 
actually attacked, or until I had certain evidence 
that they were about to to be attacked." (Page 
117, Ibid^ 

Further on, in reply to their demand for the 
withdrawal of all the troops from the harbor, he 
said : " This I cannot do ; this I will not do. 
Such an idea was never thought of by me in 
any possible contingency." 

As to this statement, the South Carolina 
Commissioners and two of the South Carolina 
Congressmen, Miles and Keitt, gave the Presi- 
dent the lie circumstantial, if not the lie direct. 
(" Rebellion Records," pp. 120 to 128, vol. i.) 

In this connection the Commissioners wrote 
to him : " You did not reinforce the garrisons 
in the harbor of Charleston. You removed a 
distinguished and veteran officer from the com- 
mand of Fort Moultrie because he attempted to 
increase his supply of ammunition. You re- 
fused to send additional troops to the same gar- 
rison when applied for by the officer appointed 
to succeed him. You accepted the resignation 
of the oldest and most efficient member of your 
Cabinet rather than allow these garrisons to be 
strengthened. You compelled an officer sta- 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 1/ 

tioned at Fort Sumter to return immediately to 
the arsenal forty muskets which he had taken 
to arm his men." General Cass had resigned 
his office of Secretary of State on the 17th of 
December, i860, for the avowed reason that 
the President had refused to reinforce Ander- 
son, and was negotiating with open and avowed 
traitors. 

In 181 2 General Cass had, in conjunction 
with General McArthur, preferred charges 
against General Hull for surrendering a United 
States fort to a foreign enemy. He could not, 
with any consistency, consent, as a Cabinet 
Minister, to the adoption of a line of policy 
that would legitimately lead to a surrender of 
important defensive works to a domestic foe. 
But so far Mr. Buchanan's course had been con- 
sistent with his declaration in his annual mes- 
sage, " that he had no right, and would not at- 
tempt, to coerce a seceding State." 

How did it happen that he so soon laid 
himself open to charges of tergiversation, in- 
consistency, and duplicity ? 

We must turn back a little and refer to some 
earlier events, now necessary to consider. Ma- 
jor Anderson had been sent to Charleston by 
order of Lieutenant-General Scott. Before this 
order had been issued, Anderson had been sum- 



1 8 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

moned to Washington by telegraph (November 
12th). His order to relieve Colonel Gardner 
was dated : Headquarters of the Army, New 
York City, November i5, i860. 

Anderson's first official letter was sent through 
the regular channels. But he was ordered by 
the Secretary of War, November 28th, to ad- 
dress his communications in future only to the 
Adjutant-General or direct to the Secretary 
(page ^^\ From this time forth Major Ander- 
son could only communicate with the enemies 
of his government, and could only receive his 
orders from those who were plotting its destruc- 
tion. It is only fair to remember this, in con- 
sidering Judge Black's assertion that General 
Scott was responsible for the failure to reinforce 
Sumter. 

There is reason to believe that the President 
himself was not made acquainted with all that 
was transpiring. 

On December 27th the following message 
was delivered to the President from General 
Scott. 

Since the formal order, unaccompanied by special in- 
structions, assigning Major Anderson to the command of 
Fort Moultrie, no order, intimation, suggestion, or com- 
munication for his government and guidance has gone 
to that officer, or any of his subordinates, from the Head- 
quarters of the Army , nor have any reports or communi- 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. I9 

cations been addressed to the General-in-Chief from Fort 
Moultrie later than a letter written by Major Anderson 
almost immediately after his arrival in Charleston Har- 
bor, reporting the then state of the work. 

G. W. Lay, 

Lieutenant-Colonel, A. D. C. 
The President of the United States. 

If General Scott and the country at large 
were kept in ignorance of Major Anderson's 
wish to occupy Sumter, the leading rebels were 
not. At the interview of the South Carolina 
delegation with Mr. Buchanan, on December 
9th, one of them explained to him what they 
meant in their letter by the expression, " Rela- 
tive military status " ; they mentioned the dif- 
ference between Anderson occupying Forts 
Moultrie and Sumter. They stated that the 
latter would be equivalent to reinforcing the 
garrison, and would, just as certainly as the 
sending of fresh troops, " lead to the result 
which we both desired to avoid." ( Vide Miles 
and Keitt's statement, page 127.) They add- 
ed : " When we rose to go, the President said, 
in substance, ' After all, this is a matter of 
honor among gentlemen. I do not know that 
any paper or writing is necessary. We under- 
stand each other. 

In the President's letter of December 31st, 
before referred to he does not deny the un- 



20 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

derstanding, but he justifies his change of 
policy by the statement, that, in transferring 
his command from Moultrie to Sumter, An- 
derson " had acted on his own responsibility 
and without authority, unless indeed he had 
tangible evidence of a design to proceed to a 
hostile act on the part of the authorities of 
South Carolina, which has not yet been al- 
lecred. He adds in substance that he would 
have ordered Anderson back if the South 
Carolina people had not taken the law in their 
own hands and occupied the other forts. This 
was mere excuse and evasion, and it must have 
been deeply humiliating to the President to 
have to resort to it. 

Major Anderson occupied Sumter on the 
night of December 26th, six days after the 
South Carolina act of secession, and the day 
before the Commissioners reached Washington. 

The Carolina people feared the move, al- 
though they thought, that as Major Anderson 
was a Southerner, the Secretary of War could 
control him. Nevertheless they had steam- 
vessels patrolling the harbor to prevent che 
crossing. 

The North was surprised and delighted at 
this bold move, because it was not generally 
known that the occupation of Sumter had been 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION, 21 

contemplated and advised by Major Anderson. 

The rebel sympathizers were proportion- 
ately disgusted because they feared it, but 
thought they had influence enough to prevent it. 

Secretary Floyd's disappointment may be 
seen from this historic telesram. 

WAR DEPARTMENT, 
Adjutant-General's Office, December 27, i860. 
Major Anderson, Fort Moultrie : 

Intelligence has reached here this morning that you 
have abandoned Fort Moultrie, spiked your guns, burned 
the carriages, and gone to Fort Sumter. It is not be- 
lieved, because there is no order for any such movement. 
Explain the meaning of this report. 

J. B. Floyd, 

Secretary of War. 

Charleston, December 27, i860. 
Hon. J. B. Floyd, Secretary of War : 

The telegram is correct. I abandoned Fort Moultrie, 
because I was certain that if attacked my men must have 
been sacrificed, and the command of the harbor lost. I 
spiked the guns and destroyed the carriages, to keep the 
guns from being used against us. 

If attacked, the garrison would never have surrendered 
without a fight. 

Robert Anderson, 

Major, First Artillery. 

It was this event that compelled Mr. Bu- 



22 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

chanan to change his policy within ten days 
after Mr. Cass left his Cabinet. He was placed 
under the coercion of events. Before, he had 
been dealing with theories ; from that time forth 
he found that he had to grapple with facts. 

The first that confronted him was the unex- 
pected and general outburst of patriotic senti- 
ment in the North. As this sentiment ex- 
tended also to the Northern Democracy, the 
President had to give his approval to Major 
Anderson's act. 

So Mr. Floyd resigned the portfolio of war 
on December 31st, the day Mr. Buchanan 
wrote his reply to the South Carolina Com- 
mission. Mr. Cobb had previously resigned. 
These changes forced a reconstruction of the 
Cabinet. Judge Black became Secretary of 
State, Governor Dix took the Treasury, Holt 
the War Office, and Stanton became Attorney- 
General. Toucey and Thompson should have 
been dismissed. In this Book of Revelations 
we have an interesting despatch from Mr. 
Thompson. 

Washington, January, 4, 1861. 

A. N. Kimball, Jackson, Miss. : 

No troops have been sent to Charleston, nor will be 
while I am a member of the Cabinet. 

J. Thompson. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 23 

Mr. Toucey's Southern sympathies were just 
as pronounced as Mr. Thompson's, and if the 
President wished to have an efficient Cabinet he 
should have gotten rid of this hostile element. 
Black, Stanton, Dix, and Holt, were able, 
earnest, and patriotic men, anxious, as we now 
know, to uphold the honor of the government ; 
but the truth is well known that Mr. Buchanan's 
feeling was expressed in his famous phrase : 
" After me the deluge." 

To understand the policy of the administration 
and the acts of Anderson, we should know the 
orders given and received in relation to the forts 
in Charleston Harbor. We therefore give a 
resuTn^ of them in order of date, omitting those 
that are unimportant or relate merely to mat- 
ters of routine. 

ADJUTANT-GENERAL'S OFFICE, 

Washington, November 24, i860. 

Major Robert Anderson, 

First Regiment Artillery, U. S. A., Commanding Fort Moul- 
trie, Charleston, S. C. : 

Major. — The Secretary of War desires that you will 
communicate, with the least delay practicable, the present 
state of your command, and every thing which may re- 
late to the condition of the work under your charge and 
its capabilities of defence, together with such views as 
you may have to suggest in respect to the same. He de- 
sires to be informed whether, in view of maintaining the 
troops ready for efficient action and defence, it might not 



24 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

be advisable to employ reliable persons, not connected 
with the military service, for purposes of fatigue and 
police. 

Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 

S. Cooper, 

Adjutant-General, 

ADJUTANT-GENERAL'S OFFICE, 

November 28, i860. 
Major Robert Anderson, 

U. S. A., etc.. Fort Moultrie. 

Major. — Your letter of the 24th instant has been re- 
ceived and submitted to the Secretary of War. It is now 
under consideration, the result of which will be duly com- 
municated to you. In the meantime, authority has been 
given by the Engineer Bureau to Captain Foster to send 
to Castle Pinckney the engineer workmen, as suggested 
by you, for purposes of repairs, etc. 

The Secretary desires that any communications you 
may have to make for the information of the Department 
be addressed to this office, or to the Secretary himself. 

Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 

S. Cooper, 

Adjutant- General. 

ADJUTANT-GENERAL'S OFFICE, 

December i, i860. 
Major R. Anderson : 

Sir. — Your letter of November aStli has been received. 
The Secretary of War has directed Brevet Colonel Huger 
to repair to this city as soon as he can safely leave his 
post, to return there in a short time. He desires you to 
see Colonel Huger and confer with him, prior to his de- 
parture, on the matters which have been confided to each 
of you. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 2$ 

It is believed, from information thought to be reliable, 
that an attack will not be made on your command, and 
the Secretary has only to refer to his conversation with 
you, and to caution you that, should his convictions un- 
happily prove untrue, your action must be such as to be 
free from the charge of initiating a collision. If attacked, 
you are, of course, expected to defend the trust commit- 
ted to you to the best of your ability. 

The increase of the force under your command, how- 
ever much to be desired, would, the Secretary thinks, 
judging from the recent excitement produced on account 
of an anticipated increase, as mentioned in your letter, 
but add to that excitement, and might lead to serious re- 
sults. 

S. Cooper. 

Fort Moultrie, S. C, December, ii, i860. 

Memorandum of verbal instructions to Major Anderson, First 
Artillery, commanding at Fort Moultrie, S. C. 

You are aware of the great anxiety of the Secretary of 
War that a collision of the troops with the people of 
this State shall be avoided, and of his studied determina- 
tion to pursue a course with reference to the military 
force and forts in this harbor which shall guard against 
such a collision. He has therefore carefully abstained 
from increasing the force at this point, or taking :any 
measures which might add to the present excited state of 
the public mind, or which would throw any doubt on the 
confidence he feels that South Carolina will not attempt 
by violence, to obtain possession of the public works or 
interfere with their occupancy. But as the counsel and 
acts of rash and impulsive persons may possibly disap- 
point those expectations of the government, he deems it 
proper that you should be prepared with instructions to 



26 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

meet so unhappy a contingency. He has therefore di- 
rected me verbally to give you such instructions. 

You are carefully to avoid every act which would need- 
lessly tend to provoke aggression ; and for that reason you 
are not, without evident and imminent necessity, to take up 
any position which could be construed into the assump- 
tion of a hostile attitude. But you are to hold possession 
of the forts in this harbor, and if attacked you are to de- 
fend yourself to the last extremity. The smallness of 
your force will not permit you, perhaps, to occupy more 
one of the three forts, but an attack on or attempt to take 
possession of any one of them will be regarded as an act 
of hostility, and you may then put your command into 
either of them which you may deem most proper to in- 
crease its power of resistance. You are also authorized 
to take similar steps whenever you have tangible evi- 
dence of a design to proceed to a hostile act. 

D. C. BUELL, 

Assistant Adjutant-General. 

This is in comformity to my instructions to Major Buell. 

John B. Floyd, 

Secretary of War. 

ADJUTANT-GENERAL'S OFFICE, 

Washington, December 14, i860. 
Major Anderson, 

First Artillery, Comtnanding Fort Moultrie, Charleston, S. C. 

Sir : — The Secretary of War directs me to give the 
following answers to certain questions contained in your 
late letters. 

If the State authorities demand any of Captain Foster's 
workmen on the ground of their being enrolled into the 
service of the State, and the subject is referred to you, 
you will, after fully satisfying yourself that the men are sub- 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 27 

ject to enrolment, and have been properly enrolled under the 
laws of the United States, and of the State of South Carolina, 
cause them to be delivered up or suffer them to depart. 

If deemed essential to the more perfect defence of the 
work, the levelling of the sand hills which command the 
fort would not, under ordinary circumstances, be con- 
sidered as initiating a collision. But the delicate ques- 
tion of its bearing on the popular mind, in its present 
excited state, demands the coolest and wisest judgment. 

The fact of the sand hills being private property, and, 
as is understood, having private residences built upon 
them, decides the question in the negative. The houses 
which might afford dangerous shelter to an enemy, being 
chiefly frame, could be destroyed by the heavy guns of 
the fort at any moment, while the fact of their being 
levelled in anticipation of an attack might betray distrust, 
and prematurely bring on a collision. Their destruction 
at the moment of being used as a cover for an enemy 
would be more fatal to the attacking force than if swept, 
away before their approach. 

An armed body, approaching for hostile purposes, 
would, in all probability, either attempt a surprise or send 
a summons to surrender. In the former case, there can 
be no doubt as to the course to be pursued. 

In the latter case, after refusal to surrender, and a 
warning to keep off, a further advance by the armed 
body would be initiating a collision on their part. 

If no summons be made by them, their purpose should 
be demanded at the same time that they are warned to 
keep off, and their failure to answer, and further advance, 
would throw the responsibility upon them. 

I am, etc., 

S. Cooper, 

Adjutant- General. 



28 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

The peculiarly infamous character ot this let- 
ter will be readily perceived. 

The army officers in the Charleston harbor 
are ordered to submit to the insolent demand 
oi the South Carolina officials, to allow them to 
enroll their workmen in their militia, and also 
prohibiting Major Anderson from removing ob- 
structions from before his guns. 

His letter of December 21st was a protest 
against this ruling. On the same day that the 
above letter was written by the direction of the 
Secretary of War, the following circular was 
sent from Washington. 

TO OUR CONSTITUENTS. 

Washington, Dec. 14, i860. 

The argument is exhausted. All hope of relief in the 
Union, through the agencies of committees, Congres- 
sional legislation, or constitutional amendments, is ex- 
tinguished, and we trust that the South will not be 
deceived by appearances or the pretence of new guaran- 
ties. In our judgment the Republicans are resolute in 
the purpose to grant nothing that will or ought to satisfy 
the South. We are satisfied the honor, safety, and inde- 
pendence of the Southern people require the organization 
of a Southern Confederacy — a result to be obtained only 
by separate State secession ; that the primary object of 
each slave State ought to be its speedy ana absolute 
separation from a union of hostile States. 
Signed by : 

Pugh, Clopton, Moore, Curry, Stallworth, Iverson, Un- 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 29 

derwood, Gartrell, Jackson, Jones, Crawford, Hawkins, 
Hindman, Jefferson Davis, A, G. Brown, Barksdale, 
Singleton, R. Davis, Cragie, Ruflfin, Slidell, Benjamin, 
Loandrum, Wigfall, Hemphill, Reagan, Benham, Miles, 
McQueen, and Ashmore. 

There can be no doubt of Floyd's knowledge 
of the sending of this secret circular. He was 
in daily consultation with many of the signers. 

One of the signers (Slidell) was his brother- 
in-law. He was busy at the time in transferring 
arms and munitions of war from Northern to 
Southern arsenals, and, finally, he knew that he 
was charged with being particeps criminis with 
Secretary Thompson in an embezzlement of 
$870,000 government funds. 

December i^, i860. 
Major Robert Anderson, etc., 

Charleston, S. C. 

I have just telegraphed Captain Foster to return any 
arms that he may have removed from Cnarleston arsenal. 

J. B. Floyd. 

WAR DEPARTMENT, 

Washington, December 21, i86o. 
Major Anderson, 

First Artillery, Commanding Fort Moultrie, S. C. 

Sir : — In the verbal instructions communicated to you 
by Major Buell, you are directed to hold possession of the 
forts in the harbor of Charleston, and, if attacked, to defend 



30 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

yourself to the last extremity. Under these instructions, 
you might infer that you are required to make a vain and 
useless sacrifice of your own life and the lives of the men 
under your command, upon a mere point of hotior. This is 
far from the President's intentions. You are to exercise a 
sound military discretion on this subject. 

It is 7ieither expected nor desired that you should expose 
your own life or that of your men in a hopeless conflict in 
defence of these forts. If they are invested or attacked by 
a force so superior that resistance would, in your judg- 
ment, be a useless waste of life, // will be your duty to yield 
to necessity, and make the best terms in your power. 

This will be the conduct of an honorable, brave, and 
humane officer, and you will be fully justified in such 
action. These orders are strictly confidential, and not 
to be communicated even to the officers under your com- 
mand without close necessity. 

Very respectfully, 

John B. Floyd, 

Secretary of War. 

This was the letter delivered by Captain John 
Withers, subsequently of the C. $. A. It was 
written the day after the secession of South 
Carolina, and delivered December 23, i860. 
Read between the lines, it meant treason pure 
and simple. On receiving it, Major Anderson 
determined to move over to Sumter without 
delay. 

The next was Floyd's telegram of December 
27th, already given. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 3 1 

HEADQUARTERS OF THE ARMY. 

New York, January 5, 1861. 

Major Robert Anderson, 

First Artillery, Commanding Fort Sumter. 

Sir : — In accordance with tne instructions of the 
General-in-Chief, I yesterday chartered the steamship 
Star of the West to reinforce your small garrison with 
two hundred well-instructed recruits from Fort Columbus, 
under First Lieut. C. R. Woods, Ninth Infantry, assisted 
by Lieuts. W. A. Webb, Fifth Infantry, and C. W. Thomas, 
"First Infantry, and Asst. Surg. P. G. I, Ten Broeck, Medi- 
cal Department, all of whom you will retain until further 
orders. Besides arms for the men, one hundred spare 
arms and all the cartridges in the arsenal on Governor's 
Island will be sent ; likewise three months' subsistence 
for the detachment, and six months' desiccated and fresh 
vegetables, with three or four days' fresh beef for your 
entire force. Further reinforcements will be sent if neces- 
sary. 

Should a fire, likely to prove injurious, be opened upon 
any vessel bringing reinforcements or supplies, or upon 
tow-boats within the reach of your guns, they may be 
employed to silence such fire ; and you may act in like 
manner in case a fire is opened upon Fort Sumter itself. 

The General-in-Chief desires me to communicate the 
fact that your conduct meets with the emphatic approba- 
tion of the highest in authority. 

You are warned to be upon your guard against all 
telegrams, as false ones may be attempted to be passed 
upon you. Measures will soon be taken to enable you to 
correspond with the government by sea and Wilming- 
ton, N. C. 

You will send to Fort Columbus by the return of the 



32 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

steamer all your sick, otherwise inefficient officers and en- 
listed men. Fill up the two companies with the recruits 
now sent, and muster the residue as a detachment. 
I am, sir, very respecfuUy, 

Your obedient servant, L. Thomas. 

Assistant Adiutant-General. 

Not received until after the Star of the West 
had been fired on. 

War Department, January lo, 1861. 
Major Robert Anderson, 

First Artillery, Cofntnanding at Fort Sumter, S. C. 

Sir : — Your dispatches to No. 16 inclusive have been 
received. Before the receipt of that of 31st December, 
announcing that the government might reinforce you at 
its leisure, and that you regarded yourself safe in your 
present position, some two hundred and fifty instructed 
recruits had been ordered to proceed from Governor's 
Island to Fort Sumter on the Star of the West, for the 
purpose of strengthening the force under your command. 
The probability is, from the current rumors of to-day, 
that this vessel has been fired into by the South Caro- 
linians, and has not been able to reach you. To meet 
all contingencies, the Brooklyn has been dispatched, with 
instructions not to cross the bar at the harbor of Charles- 
ton, but to afford to the Star of the West and those op 
board all the assistance they may need, and in the evett 
the recruits have not effected a landing at Fort Sumtej 
they will return to Fort Monroe. 

I avail myself of the occasion to express the great satis- 
faction of the government at the forbearance, discretion, 
and firmness with which you have acted, amid the per- 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 33 

plexing and difficult circumstances in which you have 
been placed. You will continue, as heretofore, to act 
strictly on the defensive ; to avoid, by all means com- 
patible with the safety of your command, a collision with 
the hostile forces by which you are surrounded. But for 
the movement, so promptly and brilliantly executed, by 
which you transferred your forces to Fort Sumter, the 
probability is that ere this the defencelessness of your 
position would have invited an attack, which, there is 
reason to believe, was contemplated, if not in active prep- 
aration, which must have led to the effusion of blood, 
that has been so happily prevented. The movement, 
therefore, was in every way admirable, alike for its hu- 
manity (and) patriotism, as for its soldiership. 
Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 

J. Holt, 

Secretary of War ad interim. 

War Department, February 23, i86r. 

Maj. Robert Anderson, 

First Artillery, Commanding Fort Sumter, Charleston Harbor, S. C. 

Sir : — It is proper I should state distinctly that you 
hold Fort Sumter as you held Fort Moultrie, under the 
verbal orders communicated by Major Buell, subsequently 
modified by instructions addressed to you from this De- 
partment, under date of the 21st of December, i860. 

In your letter to Adjutant-General Cooper, of the 16th 
instant, you say : " I should like to be instructed on a 
question which may present itself in reference to the 
floating-battery, viz.: What course would it be proper 
for me to take if, without a declaration of war or a noti- 
fication of hostilities, I should see them approaching my 
fort with that battery ? They m;iy attempt placing it 



34 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

within good distance before a declaration of hostile in- 
tention." 

It is not easy to answer satisfactorily this important 
question at this distance from the scene of action. In 
my letter to you of the loth of January, I said : 

" You will continue, as heretofore, to act strictly on the 
defensive, and to avoid, by all means compatible with the 
safety of your command, a collision with the hostile forces 
by which you are surrounded." 

The policy thus indicated must still govern your conduct. 

The President is not disposed at the present moment 
to change the instructions under which you have been 
heretofore acting, or to occupy any other than a defensive 
position. If, however, you are convinced by sufficient 
evidence that the raft of which you speak is advancing 
for the purpose of making an assault upon the fort, then 
you would be justified on the principle of self-defence in 
not awaiting its actual arrival there, but in repelling force 
by force on its approach. If, on the other hand, you 
have reason to believe that it is approaching merely to 
take up a position at a good distance, should the pending 
question be not amicably settled, then, unless your safety 
is so clearly endangered as to render resistance an act of 
necessary self-defence and protection, you will act with 
that forbearance which has distinguished you heretofore 
in permitting the South Carolinians to strengthen Fort 
Moultrie and erect new batteries for the defence of the 
harbor. This will be but a redemption of the implied 
pledge contained in my letter on behalf of the President 
to Colonel Hayne, in which, when speaking of Fort Sum- 
ter, it is said : 

" The attitude of that garrison, as has been often de- 
clared, is neither menacing, nor defiant, nor unfriendly. 
It is acting under orders to stand strictly on the defensive, 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 35 

and the government and people of South Carolina must 
know that they can never receive aught but shelter from 
its guns, unless, in the absence of all provocation, they 
should assault it and seek its destruction." 

A dispatch received in this city a few days since from 
Governor Pickens, connected with the declaration on the 
part of those convened at Montgomery, claiming to act 
on behalf of South Carolina as well as the other seceded 
States, that the question of the possession of the forts and 
other public property therein had been taken from the 
decision of the individual States, and would probably be 
preceded in its settlement by negotiation with the govern- 
ment of the United States, has impressed the President 
with a belief that there will be no immediate attack on 
Fort Sumter, and the hope is indulged that wise and 
patriotic counsels may prevail and prevent it altogether. 

The labors of the Peace Congress have not yet closed, 
and the presence of that body here adds another to the 
powerful motives already existing for the adoption of 
every measure, except in necessary self-defence, for avoid- 
ing a collision with the forces that surround you. 
Very respectfully, your obedient servant, 

J. Holt. 

This brings the orders and correspondence 
down to the close of the Buchanan administra- 
tion. In itself it would be incomprehensible 
either to the military or political student. The 
clue to the mystery is to be found in the cor- 
respondence between the Executive and the 
Hon. J. W. Hayne, the Attorney-General of 
South Carolina. 



36 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

While Mr. Crittenden was devising com- 
promises and Mr. Taylor and his confreres 
were getting up peace conventions, Mr. Hayne 
came to Washington to serve, as it were, a 
legal process on the government. He ten- 
dered payment on the part of his State for all 
government property in the borders of South 
Carolina, and in case the United States gov- 
ernment did not see fit to accept his offer, he 
gave notice, on the part of his free and sover- 
eign State, of its intention to act by forcible 
entry and detainer. Singularly enough, the 
President answered this piece of political im- 
pertinence by a long chop-logic letter through 
Mr. Holt, his Secretary of War. 

Driven from his non-intervention standpoint 
by the outburst of patriotic feeling that followed 
the occupation of Sumter, Mr. Buchanan had 
to assume the position, in a message he sent to 
Congress on the 8th of January, 1861, that he 
was bound to hold the forts as public prop- 
erty. 

Seeing that he claimed for his government 
no right of sovereignty, but only a property 
right, founded on purchase and relinquish- 
ment. South Carolina adroitly came forward 
with her claim of eminent domain and national 
sovereignty. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 37 

No one cares for this controversy now, but 
it throws a strong light on the character of the 
Old Public Functionary, and explains many ap- 
parent inconsistencies. 

Up to the time of his election to the Presi- 
dency, Mr. Buchanan had been very generally 
considered a man of ability his speeches and 
State papers were creditable, if not brilliant; 
yet as an executive officer in a great crisis he 
was an evident failure. It seems to me that his 
failure resulted from a misunderstanding of the 
philosophy of history, which caused him to 
misapprehend the first principles of national 
growth. He seemed to think that the Contract 
Sociale was something more than an illustrative 
theory ; that nations could be formed by agree- 
ment, held together by paper constitutions or 
dissolved by mutual consent. He seemed to 
think that the constitution made the Ameri- 
can Nation and was not rather the expression 
of the lex non scripta of our national life. He 
did not seem to understand the principle of the 
unification of races, and that, with us at least 
the cohesive principle was as strong as reason 
habit, pride, self-interest, and love of liberty 
could make it. The deluge overtook him and 
in its waves his political reputation perished. 

If the publication of the Rebellion records 



38 POLITICAL CONSPJMACJES 

give us no positively new information in rela- 
tion to the two expeditions sent to the relief 
of Sumter, it will at least settle some disputed 
points. 

Judge Black has recently asserted that Lieu- 
tenant-General Scott was responsible for the 
failure of these expeditions. Yet it appears 
from the record that the first attempt, at least, 
was suggested by the Lieutenant-General. On 
December 28, i860, Scott wrote to the Sec- 
retary of War, requesting : first, that Sumter 
should not be given up ; second, that it be re- 
inforced and provisioned ; and, third, that two 
armed vessels should be sent to support the 
fort. 

As Mr. Floyd resigned the next day, Gen- 
eral Scott wrote to the President direct to the 
same effect. On the 31st of December he sent 
an order to Colonel Dimick, at Fort Monroe, to 
send four companies to Sumter by the sloop-of- 
war Brooklyn. 

The President was subsequently persuaded to 
substitute a merchant steamer, the Star of the 
West, for the Brooklyn. 

Unfortunately the garrison of Sumter was 
not notified of its coming, and was taken com- 
pletely by surprise when the Morris Island bat- 
teries opened fire. Before they got ready to 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 39 

fight the vessel had turned back. This was on 
January 9th. When the fort was occupied 
fourteen days before, it must be remembered 
that it was in the hands of Captain Foster's 
workmen, and in a very unfinished state. It 
was literally filled with construction material 
and debris. The parade was covered with their 
frame workshops. The gorge was open ; the 
embrasures boarded up loosely with inch plank ; 
only the lighter guns were mounted ; the heavy 
guns were not mounted before the fifteenth, as 
stated by General Doubleday in his personal 
reminiscences of Moultrie and Sumter. The 
distance from Sumter to the Star of the West 
battery was 2,800 yards. At that distance any 
of the guns then mounted at Sumter would have 
been ineffective. The South Carolina authori- 
ties were notified of the departure and mission 
of the Star of the West by Mr. Thompson, the 
Secretary of the Interior, who learned the pur- 
pose of the President at a Cabinet meeting, the 
proceedings of which were declared confidential. 
Captain Ward, of the navy, who commanded 
the receiving ship North Carolina in New York 
harbor, in the winter of 1861, proposed during 
the month of February to relieve fort Sumter 
by using four or more small coast survey steam- 
ers. Mr. Cameron, in the synopsis of the vari- 



40 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

ous plans for the relief of Sumter, which he 
laid before President Lincoln, on March i5, 
1 86 1, says that this plan met with General 
Scott's concurrence, but that the late President 
would not allow the attempt to be made (" Re- 
bellion Records," vol. i, p. 197). Subsequently 
it is stated that Captain Ward afterward aban- 
doned his plan, after consultation with General 
Scott. Yet on the 20th of February, the Lieu- 
tenant-General wrote to Colonel H. L. Scott, 
his A. D. C, in New York City, directing him 
to prepare the expedition as soon as Captain 
Ward could get his squadron ready. Judge 
Black, then Secretary of State, is authority for 
the statement that President Buchanan with- 
drew his assent to Captain Ward's expedition 
upon General Scott's advice. 

On the 1 6th of January, 1 861, Judge Black 
addressed a letter to the Lieut.-General, urging 
a renewed attempt to reinforce Major Ander- 
son. General Scott never answered that letter, 
and the probabilities are that he had even then 
formed the opinion that any further attempt to 
relieve Sumter would be unadvisable. It is 
very improbable that the Star of the West was 
substituted for the Brooklyn upon his advice, in 
view of his earnest recommendation, already 
quoted, made upon December 28, i860, that 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 4 1 

two armed vessels be sent to the support of 
Fort Sumter. 

But there is, I think, no doubt that he was 
opposed to all attempts to relieve the garrison 
of Sumter by sea. 

General Scott, in answer to a question ad- 
dressed to him by Mr. Lincoln, on the 1 2th of 
April, replied. 

" I should need a fleet of war vessels and trans- 
ports which, in the scattered disposition of the 
navy (as understood), could not be collected in 
less than four months : 5,ooo additional regular 
troops, and 20,000 volunteers ; that is, a force 
sufficient to take all the batteries, both in the 
harbor (including Fort Moultrie) as well as in 
the approach or outer bay. To raise, organize, 
and discipline such an army (not to speak of 
necessary legislation by Congress, not now in 
session) would require from six to eight months. 
As a practical military question the time for suc- 
coring Fort Sumter with any means at hand 
had passed away nearly a month ago. Since 
then a surrender under assault or from starva- 
tion has been merely a question of time." 

What is still more conclusive is the evidence 
contained in the " Rebellion Records," of the truth 
of the assertions of Mr. Welles and Mr. Mont- 
gomery Blair: that Mr. William H. Seward 



42 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

and Lieut.-General Scott obtained the order 
from President Lincoln which detached the 
Powhatan from Mr. Fox's rehef expedition to 
Sumter. First we have the letter of Mr. Lin- 
coln (p. 406, " Rebellion Records") assuming the 
responsibility for relieving Captain Mercer and 
of placing Lieutenant D. D. Porter in command 
of the Powhatan. Next we have this letter of Mr. 
Secretary Welles' " youngcaptain named Meigs." 

QUARTERMASTER-GENERAL'S OFFICE. 

Washington, D. C, February 27, 1865. 

Bvt. Brig. Gen. E. D. Townsend, 

Assistant Adjutant-General, War Department. 

My Dear General: — The Navy Department has no 
copy of the instructions to D. D. Porter and other naval 
ofificers under which they co-operated with the expedition 
of April 1 86 1, to reinforce Fort Pickens. 

The President has none, and they have applied to me. 
My copies, I think, I placed in Hartsuff's hands. He 
was adjutant of the expedition. 

Please forward the enclosed note to him, and if you 
have copies, let me have, for the Navy Department, a 
copy of the President's order to Porter, and to other 
naval ofificers. Also of the order to Colonel Brown, which 
required all naval officers to aid him. 

General Scott knew of the expedition and its orders ; 
and you were acting confidentially with him and may 
have had custody of those orders, which were kept secret 
even from the Secretaries of War and Navy, I believe. 
Yours truly, 

M. C. Meigs, 

QuartennasUr-General, Brevet Major-General. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 43 

It is hard to understand why Gen. Scott 
sanctioned the transfer of the Powhatan from 
the Sumter to the Pickens expedition without 
the knowledge of either the Secretary of War 
or the Secretary of the Navy. He was a 
great soldier, a cultivated gentleman, the soul 
of honor, and a true patriot. Yet the fact 
seems indisputable. It may be that he knew 
he could not save Fort Sumter, and hoped to 
save Fort Pickens at the sacrifice of the other. 
A general may give up an outpost, like a 
chess-player offering a gambit pawn, but, as 
before remarked, the mystery in this case is 
that he acted without the knowledge of the 
heads of departments. The following letter 
from Gen. Meigs fully explains his connection 
with the Pickens expedition. 

Washington, Oct. 31, 1881. 

Lt. Col. Thomas M. Anderson, 

9/A Infantry, Fort McKinney, Wyo. Ter. 

My Dear Sir : — I have not time to reply fully to your 
questions about Pickens. Something on the subject 
from me you will find in Scott's two volumes of the 
"Records of the Rebellion " thus far published. 

I may say that Mr. Seward took me to see President 
Lincoln, saying that he understood that some officers of 
higher rank than myself were indisposed to advise active 
measures to relieve posts in danger. That he had noth- 
ing to say as to how I should speak to Mr. Lincoln ; he 



44 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

wished me to answer any questions put to me according 
to my best belief and knowledge. 

Mr. Lincoln asked whether Sumter could be relieved. 
I said that was a matter for the navy. It must be done 
by ships. That there might be difference of opinion on 
such a subject, but that I was sure I could find him 
young naval officers then in Washington, who would 
gladly, if authorized, undertake to attempt it. 

He then dropped the subject, and I heard no more of 
Sumter till at Santa Rosa Island I saw extracts from 
newspapers, mutilated slips sent to Fort Pickens by 
General Bragg, announcing its surrender as a military 
necessity. 

The subject of Pickens was taken up. I had passed it 
going out of Pensacola Harbor in November, i860, and 
was familiar with the maps and plans of the position in 
the engineer office. 

Could Fort Pickens be reinforced ? Yes, if done in 
time. The embrasures are a few feet only above the 
bottom of the ditch, and a coup-de-main with loss of a 
few men, could, I believed, carry it against the very in- 
sufficient garrison under Slemmer. 

How can it be done ? Send a ship of war immediately 
under sealed orders to enter the harbor and prevent boat 
expeditions crossing from Pensacola to Santa Rosa 
Island. For this purpose I recommended, for reasons 
which I stated fully, and which were derived from his 
history, Lieut. David Porter, now Admiral Porter. I 
also said Providence supplies the man and the means. 
Porter I had seen within a day or so in Washington, and 
I learned by the newspapers that the Powhatan had just 
returned from a foreign cruise. If she could cross the 
Atlantic she could at once go to Pickens. 

Send as soon as possible troops and supplies in a 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 45 

transport steamer to land and reinforce the garrison of 
Pickens. 

The Powhatan will prevent the boat expedition, which, 
I said, might be at that moment (it was after dark) under 
weigh ; if she got in, the others would relieve the for- 
tress. The island is fitted with longitudinal sand ridges, 
which would protect troops and stores landed on the 
beach east of the fort and out of the range of the rebel 
batteries in their approach to Pickens. 

The President said he would perhaps send for me 
again, I urged that the strictest secrecy was indispen- 
sable, as it was known that telegrams had communicated 
information to the Southern leaders. 

I had no suspicion of anybody in high station, but the 
ordinary business of the executive departments brings 
every paper under the eye of more than one person. A 
secretary cannot take care of the papers he signs or acts 
upon. They are too many, and clerks and others are 
necessary to perform the mere physical labor of caring 
for records and dispatching and filing official papers. I 
believe that it was suggested afterward by Porter that 
the telegraph wires around Washington ought all to be 
cut. 

The President sent for me again on a Saturday even- 
ing . or a Sunday morning, and directed that Colonel 
Keyes, Military Secretary to General Scott, and myself 
should draw up a project for the relief of Pickens, sub- 
mit it to General Scott, and do this by, I think, 2 p. M. 
of Sunday. 

We went to the engineer office, to which, though closed, 
I had access, got out the plans of Santa Rosa and of 
Pensacola Harbor, prepared our project, took it to Gen- 
eral Scott, who, after discussion, approved it as it stood, 
except the provision authorizing the commander of the 



46 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

expedition to declare martial law on the Gulf Coast, 
especially at Key West. This he thought illegal. Mr. 
Seward came in ; we discussed it ; I urged its legality 
and necessity. The Constitution was examined again, 
and Mr. Seward said that was authority enough for him, 
and we should have power to declare martial law. 

He said he wished me to go with the expedition, and 
he suggested that I should be given rank to command it. 
General Scott told him that all the power of the Presi- 
dent then could not make a captain a major even, which 
I knew well enough. I told Mr. Seward that I was in 
this contest and ready to go with my present rank or 
with none at all. 

General Scott was earnest and fully approved. He 
objected to our proposition to take a mounted battery of 
artillery then in Washmgton, as taking away all his 
strength in this city. I said : " General, if this comes to 
war you will want not a battery of artillery here, but a 
large force, and the regular array will be nothing ; it will 
be the yeomanry of the country that will come to defend 
Washington." He then consented. 

The force taken has been published. Porter had 
orders, drawn up by myself and Keyes, signed by the 
President's own hand, to take the Powhatan. Telegram 
to New York Navy Yard, and letter to her then com- 
mander from the President, ordered her to be dispatched 
under Porter's command at the earliest possible moment 
and under sealed orders, her destination unknown to her 
then commander or crew, or to the officers at the navy 
yard. 

Major Harvey Brown was ordered to command the 
troops which were gathered at New York and dispatched 
in the steamer Atlajitic, which I accompanied. 

The rest is history. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION, 47 

She was followed by the Illinois, with other troops. 

I heard no one hint any doubt of the good faith of any 
executive officer or of General Scott. He entered 
heartily into the project, and was kind and cordial to 
the authors. I think he recognized the importance of 
absolute secrecy for protection against information which 
might leak out if the project was known to any but those 
who were engaged in it. 

I think that Mr. Lincoln, Mr. Seward, General Scott, 
Harvey Brown, after he received his orders, Keyes, Lieut. 
David Porter, and myself were the only persons who 
knew the destination of the troops, of the Poivhatan, or 
of the Atlantic, until the steamers Pow/iatan and Atlantic 
reached Santa Rosa. 

The Powhatan was delayed in New York, and sailed 
only an hour or two before the Altantic, and the latter, 
being the faster vessel, arrived at least a day before the 
Powhatan, and the troops were in Pickens before the 
Powhatan hove in sight. Then, at request of Harvey 
Brown, I met the Poivhatan with difficulty, and only by 
ld\ ing the ship I was on athwart her bows, stopped her 
and explained to Porter that the fort being reinforced it 
would be a crime to expose his ship and crew to injury 
by attemptirg to enter the haibor. 

The secrecy was to prevent leaks from whatever source, 
and not from doubt of the loyalty and fidelity of any 
officer of high position. 

If you wish to keep any project secret, tell it to 
nobody, and to those to be engaged in it tell only so 
much as will direct their movements till it is necessary to 
tell more. 

All the orders for the expedition were drawn up by 
Keyes and myself, and they were signed in effect exactly 
as we advised. 



48 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

I knew of no attempt to relieve Sumter. It appeared 
afterward that Naval Secretary Welles destined the 
Powhatan for Sumter. He had not, I believe, perfected 
his plan at the time I suggested her use for Pickens, for 
when we got to New York, instead of finding her ready 
to sail, we found her crew detached and the ship partially, 
at least, dismantled, so that it took some days of active, 
earnest work to get a crew on board and make her ready 
to sail. 

When I first spoke with the President on her use, I 
had just seen in the day's papers her arrival in New York 
reported, and I supposed she could start as soon as 
ordered. 

I do not believe that the Powhatan was changed from 
the Sumter to the Pickens expedition. I believe that 
the first order was Mr. Lincoln's, giving her to Porter 
and Pickens, and that in ignorance of this order, she was 
destined by the Navy Department to Sumter. But Mr. 
Lincoln's sign-manual to Porter's orders to take com- 
mand, and to Captain Mercer's orders to resign com- 
mand, overruled the orders of the Secretary of the 
Navy, which, I believe,, were received while Porter and 
Foote, who was then in command of the Brooklyn Navy 
Yard, were straining every nerve to refit her for a desti- 
nation unknown to all navy officers and the Navy De- 
partment, except Porter. 

He called me to Brooklyn, finding the case blocked, 
and I showed Captains Mercer and Foote the sign- 
manual of the President ; told them that the Secretary of 
the Navy and the Secretary of War knew nothing of this, 
and asked which they would obey, the President or his 
Secretary. They concluded to obey the President's 
order exhibited to them. 

The President, therefore, if he changed at all the des- 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 49 

tination of the Powhatan, did it after he had signed 
orders sending her to Pickens. 

I had no occasion to discuss the question of saving or 
sacrificing Sumter as against Pickens. After advising 
the President that I could find him naval ofificers who 
would be glad to attempt the relief of Sumter, that for- 
tress was not again mentioned in my presence. 

I had no apprehension from, and I heard none ex- 
pressed of, spies in high places. My object was to avoid 
leakage, which is sure to occur in a vessel of too many 
joints or parts, and I urged that nobody know what we 
intended to do, except those who directed and controlled, 
and the orders to the Atlantic were to sail in a certain 
direction from New York, and at a certain distance open 
an order which directed only the next stage of the 
voyage, etc., etc. 

General Scott's feelings and inclinations have been 
much discussed. All I saw of him during his life was 
hearty, true loyalty, and fidelity to his oath as an officer 
of the army of the United States. 

I believe I have answered, as fully as I can without 
searching documents for dates, all vour questions. 

I remain, respectfully, your obedient servant, 
M. C. Meigs, 

Quartermaster-General, Bvt. Major-Generil, U. S. A. 

There is also a letter from General Meigs to 
Mr. Seward, too long to quote, which contains 
this felicitation, of the success of their conspir- 
acy by which the naval expedition to Sumter 
was deliberately ruined : 



50 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

" Your dispatch arrived as I was on my way 
to the Atlantic, just before the hour at which 
she was to sail, and two or three hours after 
that appointed for the Powhatan. When the 
arrow has sped from the bow it may glance aside, 
but who shall reclaim it before its flight is fin- 
ished? " (P. 369.) 

This letter was written at sea, yet Captain 
Meigs evidently feared that either the Sec- 
retary of War or the Secretary of the Navy 
might get intelligence of the orders sent to the 
Powhatan without their knowledge, and still 
reclaim her even in her flight. 

In the long letter of instructions from Gen- 
eral Scott to Colonel Harvey Brown, com- 
manding the Pickens expedition, approved 
by the President, and which was supple- 
mented by an endorsement by Mr. Lincoln, 
directing all officers of the army and navy 
-^^ to aid the expedition, there is no word to 
warn the President that the Powhatan was to 
be used for the purpose of the Pickens expe- 
dition. 

As the Poivhatan had on board all the troops 
intended to reinforce Sumter, and all the 
barges provided for the landing of both soldiers 
and supplies, when she was detached, of course 
the expedition failed. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 5 1 

It is only fair to say that Pickens was saved 
if Sumter was sacrificed/ 

The most singular fact in this connection is 
that both General Scott and General Totten 
(chief of engineers) had been asserting that 
neither Sumter nor Pickens could be saved. 

An account of the siege and fall of Fort 
Sumter may be very briefly given. It is a 
matter of very little military importance, its 
significance being altogether political- Only 
such important points in the oft-repeated story 
will be referred to, as may be necessary for a 
better understanding of the great drama of 
Rebellion, of which it was the prelude. 

Major Anderson had warned his government 
that the people of South Carolina intended to 
take forcible possession of the forts in Charles- 
ton Harbor as soon as the State convention 
adopted the ordinance of secession. He had 

' The opinions of the army and navy officers laid before President 
Lincoln, as given in the " Rebellion Record," vol. i, p. ig6, et se- 
quentia, may be summarized as follovi's : 

Gen. Scott and Gen. Totten did not think that Fort Sumter could 
be relieved w^ith the means they had or vv'ere likely to get. 

Gen. Anderson thought such an enterprise would require 20,000 
men. Gen. Seymour, his second in command, thought the attempt 
would result in a siege as formidable and protracted as that of Se- 
bastopol. 

Lieut. Synder , Eng. Corp. : four thousand men and four vessels of war. 

Lieut. R. K. Mead, Eng. Corp.: 5,000 men, supported by gun-boats. 

Dr. S. W. Crawford (afterward General) : 4,000 men, supported by 
the navy. 

Lieut, (afterward General) J. C. Davis : 3,000 men and six war 
vessels. 



52 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES. 

reason to believe this from the open declara- 
tion of their highest State officials, and their 
military preparations all over those States. He 
regarded the proclamation of the ordinance of 
secession on December 20th, as an open act of 
rebellion, and, six days after, moved to the safer 
position on the island of Sumter. To give the 
fullest possible confirmation to his belief, the 
South Carolina militia took possession of Fort 
Moultrie and Castle Pinckney the next day. 
On the 30th they seized the United States 
arsenal in Charleston, entering it by escalade. 
In point of fact they had had a guard over it for 
two weeks, under the poor pretext, before re- 
ferred to, that their slaves might take it. They 
claimed that Major Anderson's change of base 
was an act of war. Yet they had been pre- 
paring for war and levying war for months. 

They began erecting batteries about Sumter 
within twenty-four hours of its occupation. 

Lieut. Theodore Talbot, ist Art.: 3,000 men and navy. 

Capt. (afterward Gen.) A. Doubleday : 10,000 men and navy. 

Captain (afterward Gen.) Foster : 6,000 regulars, or 20,000 volun- 
teers to take them ; 10,000 regulars or 30,000 volunteers to hold 
them. 

Commodore Stringham agreed with Foster. As Foster had once 
belonged to the Coast Survey, he probably knew more about the 
question than all the rest put together. 

Gen Geo. B. McClellan, then in Cincinnati, told the writer, the 
day the rebel guns opened on Sumter, that that fort was ut- 
terly indefensible, and would not hold out forty-eight hours. This 
was somewhat surprising, as an officer of engineers, now a general in 
the army, had, on the evening before, explained to a set of gratified 
listeners, that Fort Sumter was impregnable. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 53 

They fired into the Star of the West on January 
9, 1 86 1. On the nth the governor of South 
Carolina demanded the surrender of the fort. 
On the first of March the Confederate govern- 
ment assumed control of the forces in Charles- 
ton Harbor. General Beauregard assumed 
command on the 3d, and on the same day the 
schooner Rhoda H. Shannon was fired on by 
the Confederate batteries, this being their first 
overt act of war. 

Major Anderson never feared the South 
Carolina militia ; as long as they were his only 
opponents he assured his government that he 
was perfectly secure in his position. 

But when the Confederate authorities took 
charge of the siege operations against him, 
they soon made such a show of strength and 
energy that he discovered his mistake, and 
frankly avowed it. As soon as he could do so, 
he informed the War Department, not only of 
the difficulty of holding the fort, but of the 
serious obstacles that would have to be over- 
come in effecting its relief. 

It was on the 12th of March, 1861, that the 
so-called Confederate Commissioners arrived in 
Washington, and asked permission to call on 
the President, and present their credentials as 
the embassadors of a foreign power. This was 



54 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

ot course declined, but they were nevertheless 
allowed to remain in Washington until they 
voluntarily left, after the sailing of the second 
Sumter expedition on the loth of April. 

The Rebellion records give us the de- 
spatches and letters these gentlemen and other 
confederates in political crime were allowed to 
send from Washington in the last days of Mr. 
Buchanan's, and in the early days of Mr. Lin- 
coln's administration. We will give a few 
samples. 

lolt succeeds Floyd. It means war. Cut off sup- 
plies from Anderson and take Sumter soon as possible. 

Louis T. Wigfall. 

{A United States Senator drawing pay ft om the United States Gov- 
ernment. ") 

President's reply : " Brooklyn not for South Carolina. 
On errand of mercy and relief. 

"John Tyler." 

This shows that Mr. Buchanan was himself 
responsible for the substitution of the Siar of 
the West lor the Brookly7t. 

Washington. January 8, 1861. 
The Star of the West sailed from New York on Sun- 
day with government troops and provisions. It is said her 
destination is Charleston. If so, she may be hourly ex- 
pected off the harbor. 

Louis T, Wigfall. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 55 

The fact that troops were on board was sup- 
posed to be a profound state secret. 

But there seemed to be no secrets. Even 
after Mr. Lincoln's inauguration, despatch after 
despatch was sent from Washington to the 
Confederate authorities, in relation to the move- 
ment of troops and of vessels of war, giving in- 
formation also as to all that went on in Cabinet 
meetings : that the vote in Mr. Lincoln's Cabi- 
net stood six to one in favor of withdrawing 
Major Anderson's command from Sumter ; that 
no faith could be put in Seward's promise, no 
faith in the administration ; and finally, on the 
9th of April, we have Mr. Commissioner Craw- 
ford's final despatch : " That diplomacy had 
failed. The sword must now preserve our in- 
dependence. " 

But the most interesting despatch is this : J 

Washington, April d, 1861. 
Hon. A. G. Magrath, Charleston^ S. C. 

Positively determined not to withdraw Anderson. Sup- 
plies go immediately ; supported by naval force under 
Stringham, if their landing be resisted. 

(Signed), A Friend. 

This " Friend " turned out to be James E. 
Harvey, who subsequently found means to have 
himself appointed Minister to Portugal. 

Certainly there is no other government that 



$6 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

would have allowed such traitors to have re- 
mained at large in its capital for a single day. 

But the strangest thing in this strange, eventful 
history, was the course taken by the Secretary of 
State. For years Mr. William H. Seward had 
been the political leader of Abolitionism ; he 
spoke of the antagonism between freedom and 
slavery as the irrepressible conflict, and reiterated 
Mr. Garrison's famous saying, that there is a 
" higher law than the Constitution," in a debate 
on the floor of the Senate. Yet no sooner had 
he in his official capacity declined to receive and 
recognize Messrs. Crawford, Roman, and For- 
syth, in their diplomatic capacity, than he en- 
tered into a private correspondence and nego- 
tiation with them. The Secretary seemed to 
be struck with judicial blindness, and to be 
filled with hopes as vain as those of the Bour- 
bons that their white flag will once again wave 
over fair France. He yielded to the delusion 
that the rebel States could be induced to revoke 
their ordinances of secession ; give up a contest 
he himself had declared to be irrepressible, and 
return peacefully to the Union. To effect this 
purpose, he promised that the garrison of Sum- 
ter should be withdrawn. 

At the very time the Secretary of State was 
entering upon these ways that were dark and 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 57 

tricks that were vain, Mr. Cameron, the Secre- 
tary of War, laid before Mr. Lincoln and his 
Cabinet a paper, already referred to, giving the 
opinions of many prominent naval and army 
officers, as to the expediency and possibility 
of relieving Sumter, and their suggestions as to 
how this purpose could be best effected in case 
that course should be determined on. By far 
the greatest number consulted gave their opin- 
ion that the attempt should not be made with 
the means then at the government's dispos- 
al. With the sole exception of the Hon. Mont- 
gomery Blair, the members of the President's 
Cabinet advised him to give up any pur- 
pose of relieving Fort Sumter, and to with- 
draw the garrison before the i5th of April, 
when its supply of subsistence would be ex- 
hausted. 

From a merely military point of view, this 
advice would have been sound, but Mr. Lincoln 
and Mr. Blair judged more wisely that it would 
be better to sacrifice the garrison of Sumter for 
political effect. As nearly all his military ad- 
visers had given their reasons for believing 
that Fort Sumter could not be relieved by less 
than an army of twenty thousand men and a 
powerful fleet, the President must have known 
that his expedition of two hundred men, mostly 



58 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

recruits, and the absurd naval force, under Mr. 
Fox, would fail as it did fail. But the expedi- 
tion was sent in accordance with a generous 
public sentiment, and with the knowledge that 
it would compel the rebels to strike the first 
blow. If the last man in the garrison of Sum- 
ter had perished, it would have been a cheap 
price to pay for the magnificent outburst of 
patriotism that followed. Indeed it might have 
been better if they had. 

If the example of no surrender had been set 
there, we would have had fewer capitulations to 
armed rebels afterward. 

When Mr. Seward found that Mr. Lincoln 
had determined to reinforce both Sumter and 
Pickens, he notified the rebel Commissioners of 
the fact, and induced the President to send for- 
mal notice to the authorities at Charleston. 
This note was delivered on the night of April 
8, 1 86 1, to General Beauregard and Governor 
Pickens. Then, too, the extraordinary plot was 
carried out, by which the Powhatan was de- 
tached from the Sumter expedition and sent to 
Florida. The order was sent on board of her 
after she was steaming down the harbor and 
just passing Staten Island. 

Mr. Gideon Welles, in his reminiscences, is 
very severe in his condemnation of the decep- 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 59 

tion Mr. Seward practised in this matter both on 
the Secretaries of War and the Navy. He as- 
serts that it was prompted by his determination 
to make good his promise to the rebel Commis- 
sioners, that Sumter should be evacuated. Mr. 
Blair (the Secretary of the Interior), in a letter 
published in Mr. Welles' reminiscences (p. 66), 
says : 

" Mr. Seward had two objects in detaching 
this vessel (the Powhatan). 

" I St. — It defeated the relief of Fort Sumter 
which he was pledged to surrender. 

" 2d. — Fort Pickens could be claimed as hav- 
ing been saved by an expedition conceived and 
carried into execution under his orders, and so, 
though he would by this movement abandon 
his method of meeting exactions with conces- 
sions, and violence with peace, he would signal- 
ize his abandonment of his peace policy by a 
success in administering the force policy, as 
would put himself /^r saltum at the head of his 
opponents." 

It has been asserted that General Scott was 
opposed to the relief of Sumter from his south- 
ern sympathies, and that General Anderson was 
lukewarm in its defence for the same reason. 

These charges against those distinguished 
officers can be examined together. 



6o POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

One of the lieut.-general's avowed reasons 
for not approving attempts for the relief of 
Sumter was, that Major Anderson had never 
asked for reinforcements after he occupied that 
post. This was not only true, but that officer 
had written to the adjutant-general on the 6th 
of January, that he would not ask for reinforce- 
ments, because he did not know what the ulteri- 
or designs of the government were, and for 
the further reason that from that time on he 
could only be relieved by a powerful fleet. 

His first report read to Mr. Lincoln was this : 
" I confess that I would not be willing to risk 
my reputation on an attempt to throw reinforce- 
ments into this harbor within the time for our 
relief rendered necessary by the limited supply 
of our provisions, and with a view of holding 
possession of the same, with a force of less than 
twenty thousand good and well-disciplined 
men." 

At this time General Scott and Major Ander- 
son had probably a perfect understanding and 
agreement about the Sumter problem. They 
had long been intimate personal friends. Major 
Anderson's eldest brother, who died as our first 
minister to Columbia, had been a classmate 
with Scott at William and Mary's College in 
Virginia. Anderson himself had been several 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 6 1 

times on the staff of the old chief. At the battle 
of Moleno del Rey in Mexico, Scott had to send 
his friend on a most desperate attack, in which 
he received five wounds and nearly lost his life. 
After that General Scott always showed the 
greatest sympathy and regard for him. More- 
over Major Anderson had married a daughter 
of General Clinch, an old compatriot of Scott's. 
They were both border State men, and had, in 
fine, a remarkable concordance in sympathies 
and opinions. 

It is important to state these facts in this con- 
nection, because if General Scott afterward ap- 
parently abandoned one of his most cherished 
friends to his fate, he must evidently have been 
influenced by some powerful consideration. 

It will be remembered that in his first letter 
from Moultrie, Major Anderson had urged the 
occupation in force of Castle Pinckney and Forts 
Sumter and Moultrie. The military reason for 
this is obvious. Castle Pinckney could com- 
mand and overawe Charleston so long as 
Sumter and Moultrie kept open its communi- 
cation with the sea. 

In Major Anderson s opinion all three forts or 
none should have beeji held. 

With the rest of the harbor held by an enemy. 
Fort Sumter was useless and untenable. At 



62 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

a time of great political excitement, he wrote 
of making the fort impregnable, but General 
Scott knew better, and every officer consulted 
by the Secretary of War put himself on record 
to the contrary. General Anderson was a good 
artillery officer, the author or compiler of the 
artillery text-books we were using at that time, 
and he really knew better. He told the writer 
that he knew his garrison was being sacrificed 
to a political necessity, and that tlierefore he did 
not wish another man to be sent to him. Dur- 
ing the months of January and February all the 
cotton States seceded, and Anderson knew per- 
fectly well that they could surround him with 
an army of twenty thousand men. He has also 
been censured by so-called soldiers and plaintive 
patriots for not opening fire when the rebels be- 
gan placing batteries around him. 

The writer once asked him why he did not 
open fire when he saw the first shovelful of 
earth turned at Cummings' Point. He replied, 
in effect, that he had three reasons : First, he 
was not perfectly secure against escalade until 
the middle of January ; secondly, he had orders 
to await attack ; and, thirdly, that he had not 
been educated to consider the Secretary of War 
a traitor (referring to Floyd). 

I have before said that the majority of Mr. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 63 

Buchanan's reconstructed Cabinet were able 
and patriotic men. Why was it that Major 
Anderson's orders were not changed under 
their administration ? They were temporizing 
to save the border States. We know now that 
they were attempting a vain thing. It was not 
thought so then. The hopeful put faith in 
peace conventions and Crittenden compromises. 

If Major Anderson had opened fire on the 
Carolina militia on the 27th of December, let us 
speculate for a moment on the probable re- 
sults. 

Would Mr. Buchanan have called out the 
military strength of the nation to have sustained 
him? 

It is certain he would not. Then, no mat- 
ter what the fate of Sumter, which, indeed, 
would have been as dust in the balance, the 
obvious result would have been that Mr. Lin- 
coln could only have gone to Washington like 
Cromwell, at the head of his Covenanters. 
What a sad precedent would this have been ? 
What a loss of prestige ? What a sacrifice of 
moral power ? 

The State of Kentucky, instead of remaining 
loyal, would have been actively hostile, and the 
war would have opened at once on the Ohio and 
the Potomac. 



64 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

In that event thousands of hardy troops that 
hastened to the defence of the national capital 
would, in the first instance, have had to guard 
their own borders. McClellan and Rosecrantz 
could not have invaded Western Virginia if 
rebel camp-fires had been lighted on the hills 
back of Covington. The ultimate result might 
have been the same, but the final triumph 
would have been more difficult and long de- 
ferred. 

General Anderson's course at Sumter, and 
his popularity as a Kentuckian, turned the 
wavering sentiment in that State in favor of the 
the Union. It was in recognition of this fact 
that Mr. Lincoln, himself a Kentuckian, sent 
General Anderson there as the first department 
commander. 

These considerations had also great influence 
with General Scott. But when Judge Black 
was urging him, much too late, to send re- 
inforcements to Sumter, he was also possessed 
with the idea that the rebels had formed a plot 
to seize Washington City just before Mr. Lin- 
coln's inauguration. Our navy was scattered 
over the four quarters of the globe, and our 
little army was, for the most part, stationed in 
insignificant fragments on our most distant 
frontiers. To collect a few reliable regulars 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 65 

in Washington was his first and greatest 
care. 

Yet why did he not reinforce Sumter after 
the capital was secured ? 

I can also answer this question. 

I once heard General Scott and General 
Anderson discuss the Sumter problem in New 
York City, during the siege of Fort Wagner 
by General Gilmore. Some one asked General 
Anderson as to the best way of taking Sumter. 
He replied : " Take Charleston." General Scott 
then said : " Yes, Robert, that is the way to take 
the Charleston forts. To attack Sumter from 
the sea, is taking hold of the wrong end of the 
poker." 

There are only two other points in connec- 
tion with this famous siege that require notice. 

Mr. Blair, in his published letter, already re- 
ferred to, makes this statement : 

" General Anderson had made preparations 
to defend it (Sumter), but left his barracks stand- 
ing, to be fired at the first shot, instead of pull- 
ing them down and taking to his casemates as 
he certainly would have done if he had not been 
authoritatively told that the fort was to be evacu- 
ated as soon as the small supply of provisions 
on hand had been consumed." 

In this connection I beg leave to quote from 



66 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

a letter written to me by General Truman Sey- 
mour on this subject. Seymour commanded one 
of the companies of artillery in Sumter, and was 
General Anderson's room-mate during the siege. 
" General Anderson did not take down ' the 
wooden barracks ' at Sumter — the necessity for 
which was so sagely suggested by Mr. Blair, — 
because there were none to take down ! The 
three barracks were permanent structures of 
brick, three stories high, and built solidly against 
the faces of the casemates ; they were con- 
structed by the engineers to be fire-proof, and 
were supposed so to be : not a member of the 
garrison ever suspected they would or could be 
consumed as they were. The floors were of 
brick arches upon iron beams, overlaid by a 
board floor ; the sash and casings of windows 
were of wood, and the slate roofing was fastened 
to board sheathing. The burning of these 
buildings was only a temporary inconvenience ; 
after the dense smoke had been blown off 
there was no longer any point worthy of notice in 
connection with them. The burning of the gates 
to the fort could easily have been made good 
by the rubbish near it. When Sumter was oc- 
cupied, the parade was crowded with wooden 
sheds, shops, etc., all of which were soon cleared 
away. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 6y 

" The point made by Mr. Blair is too absurd 
to be worthy even of refutation ; he should 
have known better (as a graduate of West 
Point) than to have raised it. 

" General Anderson never had the slightest 
suggestion from the government, or from any 
member of it, that the command would be with- 
drawn. He would doubtless have felt profoundly 
humiliated at any such acknowledgment of 
weakness — so would any of the officers there." 

Strange as it may seem, General Seymour 
was mistaken in supposing that his commanding 
officer had never received an intimation that 
the garrison of Sumter would be withdrawn. 
On the 2 5th of March Mr. Lamon, Mr. Lin- 
coln's private secretary, went to Sumter and 
told Major Anderson that in a few days his 
command would probably be transferred to 
another fort. He also made the same communi- 
cation to Governor Pickens. It shows how 
closely Anderson kept his counsel, when he 
never communicated this intelligence to his 
second in command. This gave rise to a very 
strange episode.' 

'The Chew Memorandum, presented to Gov. Pickens and Gen. 
Beauregard by Lieut. Talbot and Robert S. Chew, Esq., was as fol- 
lows : 

" I am directed by the President of the United States to notify 
you to expect an attempt will be made to supply Fort Sumter with 
provisions only, and that if such an attempt be not resisted, no effort 



68 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

The next day General Beauregard wrote 
Major Anderson a very friendly personal note, 
congratulating him on his prospective removal, 
offering to give him every assistance possible, 
but saying finally that he would only require of 
him his statement on honor, that he had not 
mined the fort. (" Rebellion Records," vol. i, p. 
222.) Anderson replied : * * * "I must state 
most distinctly, that if I can only be per- 
mitted to leave on the pledge you mention, I 
shall never, so help me, God, leave this fort 
alive." [Ibid.) 

There was a rumor that Fort Sumter was to 
be blown up by the Yankees when they left it. 

Curiously enough. Captain Foster had writ- 
ten to the Chief of Engineers, December 19, 
i860, "that he proposed to connect a power- 
ful Daniel's battery with the magazine at Sum- 
ter, by means of wires stretched across under 
water to Fort Moultrie, and to blow up Sumter 
if taken by an armed force." 

This, of course, was before that fort was oc- 
cupied by our people. But how did the rebels 
get the rumor ? Evidently there was a leaky 
vessel in the Engineer Department. 

to throw in men, arms, or ammunition will be made without further 
notice, or in case of an attack on the fort. 

"April 8, i86i." 

This memorandum was not communicated to Major Anderson, and 
the Powhatan, with the troops, was secretly detached. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION, 69 

It may be inferred from General Seymour's 
letter that he believed that the fort could have 
been held longer ; Captain Foster, in his report 
of the siege, also says as much. 

This is undoubtedly true. By putting the 
garrison on starvation rations of pork, the fort 
could probably have been held for a week or 
ten days longer. But what would have been 
gained by this delay ? There were eighty men 
(only thirty-five of whom were skilled artiller- 
ists) holding a sea-coast fort against eight thou- 
sand. Apart from the moral effect, the only 
purpose in delay would have been to have 
kept this many men a little longer from the 
Northern frontier. This would have been a 
sufficient reason, and the sacrifice would have 
been made, had the government ever intimated 
its desire that it should be made. 

The Administration of Mr. Lincoln showed 
nothing but doubt and vacillation in regard to 
the Sumter question, up to the time of the fall 
of the fort. 

Evidently all it cared for was a show of force 
on the part of the garrison, and a proof of 
aggression on the part of the rebels. 

This is unquestionably so, or they would not 
have greeted the defenders of Sumter with 
thanks and approval. 



70 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

The truth is, I believe, that they intended to 
sacrifice them for moral effect, and both the 
Administration and the nation were happy to 
see them get off with their lives. 

From February 23d to April 4th, no orders 
were sent from the War Department to Fort 
Sumter. Its commanding officer was thrown 
on his own resources, left to his own devices, 
yet hampered by the old order not to fire unless 
attacked. At last, however, Secretary Cameron 
sent the following autograph letter : 

WAR DEPARTMENT. 
Washington, D. C, April 4, 1861. 

Major Robert Anderson, U. S. Army. 

Sir : Your letter of the ist instant occasioned some 
anxiety to the President. 

On the information of Captain Fox, he had supposed 
you could hold out till the 15th instant without any great 
inconvenience, and had prepared an expedition to relieve 
you before that period. 

Hoping still that you will be able to sustain yourself 
till the nth or 12th instant, the expedition will go for^ 
ward ; and, finding your flag flying will attempt to provis- 
ion you ; and, in case the effort is resisted, will endeavor 
also to reinforce you. 

You will therefore hold out, if possible, till the arrival 
of the expedition. 

It is not, however, the intention of the President to sub- 
ject your command to any danger or hardship beyond what, 
in your judgment, would be usual in military life ; and he 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 7 1 

has entire confidence that you will act as becomes a 
patriot and soldier under all circumstances. 

Whenever, if at all, in your judgment, to save yourself 
and command, a capitulation becomes a necessity, you are 
authorized to tnake it. 

Simon Cameron, 

Secretary of War. 

The answer to the above letter was inter- 
cepted by the Confederates and sent to Mont- 
gomery. It never reached Washington until it 
went there with the Confederate archives. It 
was accompanied by a private note to Colonel 
Thomas asking him to destroy it. 

[No. 96.] Fort Sumter, S. C, April Z, 1861. 

Col. L. Thomas, 

Adjutant-General, U. S. Army. 

Colonel : I have the honor to report that the re- 
sumption of work yesterday (Sunday) at various points on 
Morris Island, and the vigorous prosecution of it this 
morning, apparently strengthening nearly all the batteries 
which are under the fire of our guns, show that they 
either have received some news from Washington which 
has put them on the qui vive, or that they have received 
orders from Montgomery to commence operations here. 
I am preparing by the side of my barbette guns protection 
for our men from the shells, which will be almost con- 
tinuously bursting over or in our work. 

I had the honor to receive by yesterday's mail the let- 
ter of the honorable Secretary of War, dated April 4, and 
confess that what he there states surprises me very 
greatly, following as it does, and contradicting so posi- 



72 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

tively, the assurance Mr. Crawford telegraphed he was 
authorized to make. I trust that this matter will be at 
once put in a correct light, as a movement made now, 
when the South has been erroneously informed that none 
such will be attempted, would produce most disastrous 
results throughout our country. 

It is, of course, now too late for me to give any advice 
in reference to the proposed scheme of Captain Fox. I 
fear that its result cannot fail to be disastrous to all con- 
cerned. Even with his boat at our walls, the loss of life 
(as I think I mentioned to Mr. Fox) in unloading her 
will more than pay for the good to be accomplished by 
the expedition, which keeps us, if I can maintain posses- 
sion of this work, out of position, surrounded by strong 
works, which must be carried to make this fort of the least 
value to the United States Government. 

We have not oil enough to keep a light in the lantern 
for one night. The boats will have, therefore, to rely at 
night entirely upon other marks. I ought to have been 
informed that this expedition was to come. Colonel 
Lamon's remark convinced me that the idea, merely 
hinted at to me by Captain Fox, would not be car- 
ried out. We shall strive to do our duty, though I 
frankly say that my heart is not in the war which I see is 
to be thus commenced. That God will still avert it, and 
cause us to resort to pacific measures to maintain our 
rights, is my ardent prayer. 

I am, Colonel, very respectfully, 

Your obedient servant, 

Robert Anderson, 
Major, First Artillery, Commanding. 

In a previous letter Major Anderson had re- 
proached the War Department for leaving him, 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 73 

after nearly forty years' service, without orders, 
intelligence, or advice. 

It is on the the strength of the expression, 
" I frankly say that my heart is not in the war," 
that General Doubleday accuses General Ander- 
son of want of loyalty and of being pro-slavery in 
sympathy. 

It so happens that after nearly forty years of 
faithful service, the fame of that officer has 
come to rest on one episode of his life— his de- 
fence of Moultrie and Sumter. He foueht 
bravely in the Black Hawk, the Seminole, and 
the Mexican wars. He served with distinction 
on the staff of Lieut.-General Scott. He wrote 
several useful works for his branch of the ser- 
vice, and did as much hard work as any officer 
of his day ; yet if it can be made to appear that 
he was weak, unwise, or wicked in the per- 
formance of his last great trust, then his long 
years of honorable toil will have been in vain, 
for it is always the last important act that gives 
tone and color to the picture of our lives. 

No wonder he used the expression attributed 
to him. For months he had been isolated. He 
felt deserted and sacrificed. He had seen the 
ebb-tide of patriotism, and the shoals and quick- 
sands it left around him ; he did not know of 
the mighty tidal wave of national feeling that 



74 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

had commenced its flow. What wonder was it 
that he was sick at heart ? Brutus at Philippi 
shrank for a moment before the premonition of 
his doom. Peter denied his Master, and the 
Master himself upon the cross cried out : " Eli, 
Eli, lama sabachthani .'^ " 

Who did not recoil from that prospect that 
appalled Webster, — "• of States dissevered, dis- 
cordant, belligerent ; of a land rent with civil 
feuds, and drenched, it may be, in fraternal 
blood?" 

There was not an honest and patriotic man 
in the country who did not dread to see the 
war begun. And of all sorts and conditions of 
men the soldier best knows the horrors of war, 
and is most unwilling to see his own country 
subjected to its miseries. Of course their finer 
feelings are blunted in the heat of ac^^ion. 

" The blood more stirs to rouse a lion 
Than to start a hare." 

No one has ever claimed that the siege of 
Sumter was at all remarkable in a military 
sense. It was a moral and not a military crisis. 

The Count of Paris says of General Ander- 
son, that " he showed a great moral courage — a 
very rare thing in revolutions." 

The government hesitated to strike, and let 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 7$ 

I dare not wait upon I would. It hesitated and 
temporized, apparently weighing small physical 
advantages against the prestige of moral 
right. It seemed at first more inclined to fol- 
low the Macchiavellian policy of Louis XI, 
rather than the braver example of Themis- 
tocles. 

But Anderson's action changed all this. The 
struggle inaugurated at Sumter ended in a 
great revolution. 

In this contest, while the South was in re- 
bellion, it was the North that forced the revo- 
lution. 

Formerly we had only a Union of States, 
now we have a United People. Formerly we 
claimed to be a nation only by the consent of 
Sovereign members bound by artificial ties ; 
now we claim to be a Sovereign People devel- 
oped through psychological laws. 

Like other nations we are beginning to have 
an autonomy of action and a political equation. 

The next and not less important feature in 
our Revolution was the abolition of slavery. 
We cast out that unclean thing, because it had 
become heterogeneous and hateful. We placed 
the higher law of Equality m our Constitu- 
tion, because it was of endogenous growth. 
This necessity for a change in our government 



76 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES. 

had grown out of a change in our character as 
a people. Such a time in a nation's Hfe is hke 
a crisis in a disease. A nation that cannot 
stand it, disintegrates. We have had our trial 
and tragedy, and bitter and bloody it was. 
But now that the issue is settled, we should 
criticise the events of the time and the men of 
that hour with all possible fairness. 

There is glory enough for all. And although 
those who came at the eleventh hour should 
receive their reward, even as those who came 
at the first, yet the nation will not forget those 
who were the first to stand firm, and who were 
faithful among the faithless and faithful to the 
end. 



CHAPTER II. 



RETROSPECTIVE 



IF the familiar statement were renewed that 
Republican governments have produced 
more than their share of the great men of his- 
tory, it would be accepted as a truism by nearly 
all readers of the English-speaking race. If a 
second thought were given to the proposition, 
the heroes of Plutarch, and the Hampdens and 
Cromwells, the Washingtons and Lincolns of 
modern times would be passed in almost un- 
conscious mental review as a satisfactory illus- 
tration of the assumption. Yet all thoughtful 
men of our time know that there is a reverse to 
our Democratic medallion. 

If very heroic qualities are developed in our 
times of trial, very undesirable qualities are 
manifested in our seasons of prosperity. That 
majorities can be as despotic as crowned kings, 
is pretty generally conceded. That popular 
opinion is as impatient of contradiction as the 
most pedantic pedagogue, seems to be as unde- 

77 



78 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

niably true. Hence it too often happens that 
in repubHcs there is a certain duplicity or ti- 
midity in criticism, if the question to be examined 
is one about which a popular opinion has been 
formed. 

Mr. John Stuart Mill was asked on the hust- 
ings, on the only occasion on which he stood 
for Parliament, if he had not said that the Brit- 
ish workingmen were given to lying. Mr. Mill 
said, unhesitatingly, that he had. The British' 
mob were generous enough to cheer him. No 
doubt they consoled themselves with the thought 
that, on Falstaff's authority, the whole world 
was given to the same practice. 

The American public have not been accused 
of this fault, yet, in discussing the causes and 
purposes of our late civil war, there is a very 
politic, yet positive, suppressio veri. 

We all talk and write as if our fore-thoughts 
had been the same as our after-thoughts. In 
the hurley-burley of the present we forget the 
passions and prejudices of the past. There 
seems to be a quiet assumption on the part 
of most middle-aged men that their political 
opinions have not changed since the rebel guns 
opened on Sumter. We are all political proph- 
ets, but, unfortunately, prophets after the facts. 

Nearly all men condemn slavery now. This 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 79 

is right and proper. The image of Dagon is 
overthrown. Who ever worshipped Dagon ? 
No man. It is a safe and pleasant thing to re- 
vile a blind and helpless Samson. 

If our elections are any index to popular opin- 
ion, the great majority of voters in this country 
up to i860 either did not believe that slavery 
was wrong or were indifferent to it as a political 
issue. If Mr. Lincoln had proclaimed on the 
4th of March, 1861, that he was about to wage 
a war for the suppression of slavery, in all 
human probability his administration would 
have proved an utter failure.' 

There is one thing in connection with our 
civil war that we have almost forgotten, and 
which future historians are likely to overlook. 
It is, that the cause of the gravest apprehension 
to all thoughtful men and women in all parts of 
our country was at that time the fear of a ser- 
vile insurrection in the South. Undoubtedly 
one of the gravest sins the rebel leaders have 
to answer for is, that in bringing on the war, 

' The Abolition party so late as the Presidental election of 1852 only 
numbered 156,149 (Hale's vote), out of a total of 3,144,201 votes cast. 

It w^as often mentioned as a matter of ridicule or reproach during 
the war, that the original abolitionists were rarely found at the front. 
It cannot be fairly assumed that this fact proves their insincerity. A 
large proportion of these fanatics were preachers, scholars, quakers, 
or aged men, whose age, infirmities, or callings prevented them from 
becoming military crusaders in the cause. I do not doubt that Gid- 
dings. Garrison, or Wendell Phillips would have died at the stake 
rather than denied their abolition sentiments. 



8o POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

they risked this fate for their misguided fol- 
lowers. 

I can state on the best possible authority that 
General Anderson dreaded this possibility with 
the most painful intensity. And why was this 
apprehension not realized ? Simply and solely 
because slavery degraded and emasculated the 
black race more than we thought.^ 

If, for instance, the slaves had retained the 
courage and wild spirit of freedom of the Zulu 
Kaffirs, who does not know that there would 
have been a holocaust of houses, barns, and 
bridofes all through the South, as soon as the 
Federal soldiers crossed the Potomac ? What 
murders, torturings, and ravishings would there 
not have been had a black Spartacus arisen in 
every Southern State ! Is this mere theorizing ? 
Ask the people of Northern Minnesota what 
atrocities the Sioux committed when they took 
the war-path in 1863. And the provocation of 

' I am indebted for this statement and the deduction made from it, 
to Gov. Chas. Anderson, the sole surviving brother of Gen. Robert 
Anderson. 

About the time of the bombardment of Sumter, Gov. Anderson 
made a Union speech in San Antonio, Texas, during the delivery of 
which his life was repeatedly threatened by armed desperadoes, who 
were enraged by his vehement denunciation of the rebel leaders. 

He was subsequently imprisoned by Gen. Ben. McCoUough, C. S. 
A., but made a remarkable escape into Mexico. He made his way 
back to Ohio, and was commissioned Colonel of the 63d Ohio Inft. 
He was wounded at Stone River, ran on the Republican ticket for 
Lieut. Governor of Ohio, was elected by a 100,000 majority, and suc- 
ceeded Brough as governor on his death in 1865. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 8 1 

the worst-used Indian tribe we ever cheated 
out of home and lands was mild as moonlight 
compared to the curse and wrong of slavery. 

Fortunately, these apprehensions were not 
realized. But we can not fairly judge of the men 
who were prominent actors in the first act of 
our Rebellion, without analyzing all the consid- 
erations that influenced them at that time. 

The abolition of slavery was not one of the 
objects, but one of the accidents, of the war. 
We may say now that it would have been a 
justifiable and praiseworthy object ; yet this is 
an after- thought. 

It must be stated, in all fairness, that although 
a great many people thought slavery was wrong, 
even before our war, yet so strong was the rev- 
erence for the written law, that but few would 
have risked a war to abolish it. 

The object of the war is generally and more 
properly stated to have been the preservation 
of the Union. Admitting thai this was its ob- 
ject, it must now be admitted that there was an 
accidental consequence more important even 
than the perpetuation of the Union. 

As before stated, it is our union as a people. 

The war established the paramount claim of 
the general government on the personal al- 
legiance of every man in the country. 



82 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

It established the right of the government to 
punish everv man in the country for a violation 
of its laws. Mr. Calhoun claimed that a State 
could throw the aegis of its protection over any 
citizen, and thus nullify the power of the gen- 
eral government. This will never be seriously 
claimed again. 

It has established for us as a fact that which 
was once held by a few as' a metaphysical the- 
ory, that the true principle of nationality is the 
cohesive power of race. 

This may seem to be a merely plausible plati- 
tude. Yet it is a self-evident deduction. Peo- 
ple of the same race, when living contiguously, 
will, of course, speak the same language. Un- 
der this great bond of union, they are likely to 
be subject to the influence of the same laws and 
literature. Consequently, their tastes and am- 
bitions will be given the same bent. Living 
and laboring under the same conditions, they 
will have the same temptations to vice, the same 
incentives to virtue. They will find it to their 
advantage to combine in business enterprises, 
and this can only be successfully done by people 
who speak the same language and have been 
raised in the same way. In fine, masses of 
men moving in the same direction and under 
similar conditions have to combine. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 83 

There were many of the last generation who 
thought they could escape the effect of this law 
of race. We know now that any community 
which would claim independent action in the 
midst of any of the great nationalities of our day 
would suffer annihilation. The time when dy- 
nasties and factions can stand in the way of 
national progress, or interfere with the autono- 
mous action of a race, is past. 

Without considering these facts and weighing 
these considerations, we cannot fairly estimate 
the political problem of Sumter. 

It was not a question of blood and bones, 
and bricks and mortar. 

" It was not all of life to live, 
Nor all of death to die." 

A question of national existence, and, more 
than that, of national character, hung upon the 
issue. 

From the time Major Anderson went to Fort 
Moultrie to the time he left Sumter, it is hard 
to characterize the course of both the Buchanan 
and the Lincoln administrations in dignified yet 
appropriate terms. Now that their despatches 
have been published, it is evident that both ad- 
ministrations wished that officer to relieve them 
of responsibility by taking his own course. 



84 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES 

Probably neither could have relieved Sumter 
without risking the safety of Washington. Nor 
could they abandon without sacrificing a prin- 
ciple, so both temporized and left the garrison 
of Sumter to its fate. ' 

If Major Anderson had disobeyed his orders 
and fought, he would have been whipped. 
Then he could have been made a scape-goat, 
and cashiered. Had he capitulated before a 
fight, he would have been equally open to cen- 
sure. 

He felt that he was badly treated and said 
so, yet in spite of this, and in disregard of per- 
sonal sympathies and friendships, he was true 
to his duty. 

When Marshal Bazaine was tried for treason, 
he said, in the course of his trial, that after the 
Emperor Napoleon was dethroned he did not 
know what to do. " What! " asked the Due 
D'Aumale, the president of his court-martial, 
" did France then cease to exist ? " 

Major Anderson had no such doubts. He 
knew he had a country to cherish, love, and de- 
fend, in spite of mistakes and vacillations of 
Cabinets and leaders. After the first overt act 
of war, after he had to deal with facts, the great 
mind of Abraham Lincoln asserted itself. From 

' See Addenda. 



PRECEDING THE REBELLION. 8$ 

that time on we had nothing to be ashamed of. 
From that time on we had grand, not petty, 
war ; statesmanship, not statecraft. 

As stated in the beginning, the poHtical con- 
spiracies which preceded our civil war of 1861 
were the consequences and not the causes of 
the conflicting interests which made the contest 
inevitable. However spontaneous the out- 
burst of revolutions and rebellions may appear, 
their force must at first be directed by con- 
spirators. For, to overthrow an established 
government, force is required, combination is 
essential, and secrecy is a necessity. Other- 
wise all such attempts would be suppressed in 
their inception. 

It was on the 5th of January, 1861, the day 
that the Star of the West started for the relief 
of Sumter, that the Southern leaders in Wash- 
ington held their secret caucus in which they 
organized their rebellion. This course had been 
determined long before, but it was on this oc- 
casion that these four resolutions were adopted. 
To wit : 

I St. The cotton States should secede imme- 
diately. 

2d. Delegates should be chosen to meet in 
Montgomery, Ala., on Feb. i5th, to organize 
a provisional government. 



86 POLITICAL CONSPIRACIES. 

3d. That the conspirators should remain in 
the Federal Congress during the Buchanan Ad- 
ministration, to obstruct coercive legislation ; 
and 

4th. Davis, Mallory, and Slidell were ap- 
pointed a committee to carry out the objects of 
the meeting. 

That their conspiracies utterly failed was 
owing to the fact, which was so impressively 
stated by Mr. Webster in the Senate in i85o, 
" that the machinations of men are powerless 
against the laws of nature." 

Under the directive force 01 moral laws the 
balance between the centrifugal and centripetal 
forces of our political system seems to be re- 
established, and let us hope that in the future, 
as in the past, " Treason can but peep to what 
it would." 

THE END. 



ADDENDA. 



Reports of Generals Anderson and Beauregard of the 
bombardment and evacuation of Fort Sumter. 

TELEGRAM, 

Steamship Baltic, off Sandy Hook, 

April i8 (1861), 10:30 A.M. via New York. 

Having defended Fort Sumter for thirty-four hours, 
until the quarters were entirely burned, the main gates 
destroyed by fire, the gorge walls seriously injured, the 
magazine surrounded by flames, and its door closed from 
the effect of heat, four barrels and three cartridges of 
powder only being available, and no provisions remain- 
ing but pork, I accepted terms of evacuation offered by 
General Beauregard, being the same offered by him on 
the nth inst., prior to the commencement of hostilities, 
and marched out of the fort Sunday afternoon, the 14th 
inst., with colors flying and drums beating, bringing away 
company and private property, and saluting my flag with 

fifty guns. 

Robert Anderson, 

Major First Artillery, Commanding. 

Hon. S. Cameron, 

Secretary of War, Washington. 
87 



88 ADDENDA. 

REPLY. 

War Department, "'Vashington, 

Atril 20, 1 86 1. 
Major Robert Anderson, 

Late Commanding at Fort Sumter : 

My Dear Sir. — I am directed by the President of the 
United States to communicate to you, and through you 
to the officers and men of your command at Forts Moul- 
trie and Sumter, the approbation of the government of 
your and their judicious and gallant conduct there, and 
to tender you and them the thanks of the government 

for the same. 

Simon Cameron, 

Secretary of War, 

GENERAL BEAUREGARD'S REPORT. 

Hdqrs. Provisional Army, Charleston, S. C. 

April 2T, 1S61. 

Sir. — I have the honor to submit the following detailed 
report of the bombardment and surrender of Fort Sum- 
ter and the incidents connected therewith. Having com- 
pleted my channel defences and batteries in the harbor 
necessary for the reduction of Fort Sumter, I dispatched 
two of my aids at 2:20 p.m., on Thursday, the nth of 
April, with a communication to Major Anderson, in com- 
mand of the fortification, demanding its evacuation. I 
offered to transport himself and command to any port in 
the United States he might elect, to allow him to move 
out of the fort with company arms and property and all 
private property, and to salute his flag in lowering it. He 
refused to accede to the demand. As my aids were 
about leaving. Major Anderson remarked that if we did 



ADDENDA. 89 

not batter him to pieces he would be starved out in a 
few days, or words to that effect. This being reported 
to me by my aids on their return with his refusal at 
5:10 P.M., I deemed it proper to telegraph the purport of 
his remark to the Secretary of War. Ir» reply I received 
by telegraph the following instructions at 9:10 p.m. 

" Do not desire needlessly to bombard Fort Sumter. If 
Major Anderson will state the time at which, as indicated 
by him, he will evacuate, and agree that in the meantime 
he will not use his guns against us unless ours should be 
employed against Fort Sumter, you are authorized thus 
to avoid effusion of blood. If this, or its equivalent, be 
refused, reduce the fort as your judgment decides most 
practicable." 

At I P.M. I sent my aids with a communication to 
Major Anderson, based on the foregoing instructions. It 
was placed in his hands at 12:45 a.m., 12th inst. He 
expressed his willingness to evacuate the fort on Monday 
at noon, if provided with the necessary means of trans- 
portation, and if he should not receive contradictory in- 
structions from his government or additional supplies, 
but he declined to agree not to open his guns on us in 
the event of any hostile demonstrations on our part 
against his flag. This reply, which was opened and shown 
to my aids, plainly indicated that if instructions should 
be received contrary to his purpose to evacuate, or if he 
should receive his supplies, or if the Confederate troops 
should fire on hostile troops of the United States, or upon 
transports bearing the United States flag, containing men, 
munitions, and supplies designed for hostile operations 
against us, he would still feel himself bound to fire upon us, 
and to hold possession of the fort. As in consequence of 
a communication from the President of the United States 
to the governor of South Carolina, we were in momentary 



90 ADDENDA. 

expectation of an attempt to reinforce Fort Sumter, or 
of a descent upon our coast to that end from the United 
States fleet then lying at the entrance of the harbor, it 
was manifest by an imperative necessity to reduce the 
port as speedily as possible, and not to wait until the 
ships and the fort should unite in a combined attack 
upon us. Accordingly my aids, carrying out my instruc- 
tions, promptly refused to accede to the terms proposed 
by Major Anderson, and notified him in writing that 
our batteries would open on Fort Sumter in one hour. 
This notification was given at 3:20 a.m. of Friday the 
12th instant. The signal shell was fired at Fort Johnson 
at 4:30 A.M. At about 5 o clock the fire of our batter- 
ies became general. Fort Sumter did not open fire until 
7 o'clock, when it commenced with a vigorous fire upon 
the Cummings' Point iron battery. The enemy next di- 
rected his fire upon the enfilade battery on Sullivan's 
Island, constructed to sweep the parapet of Fort Sumter, to 
prevent the working of the barbette guns, and to dismount 
them. This was also the aim of the floating battery, the 
Dalhgren battery, and the gun batteries at Cummings' 
Point. The enemy next opened on Fort Moultrie, be- 
tween which and Fort Sumter a steady and almost con- 
stant fire was kept up throughout the day. These three 
points — Fort Moultrie, Cummings' Point, and the end of 
Sullivan's Island, where the floating battery, Dahlgren 
battery, and the enfilade battery were placed — were the 
points to which the enemy seemed almost to confine his 
attention, although he fired a number of shots at Captain 
Butler's mortar battery, situated to the east of Fort Moul- 
trie, and a few at Captain James' mortar batteries at 
Fort Johnson. During the day (12th instant) the fire of 
my batteries was kept up most spiritedly, the guns and 
mortars being worked in the coolest manner, preserving 



ADDENDA. 9I 

the prescribed intervals of firing. Toward evening it be- 
came evident that our fire was very effective, as the enemy 
was driven from his barbette gun which he attempted to 
work in the morning, and his fire was confined to his 
casemated guns, but in a less active manner than in the 
morning, and it was observed that several of his guns en 
barbette were disabled. During the whole of Friday night 
our mortar batteries continued to throw shells, but, in 
obedience to orders, at longer intervals. The night was 
rainy and dark ; and as it was almost confidently expected 
that the United States fleet would attempt to land troops 
upon the islands or to throw men into Fort Sumter by 
means of boats, the greatest vigilance was observed at all 
our channel batteries, and by our troops on both Morris 
and Sullivan's islands. 

Early on Saturday morning all our batteries reopened 
upon Fort Sumter, which responded vigorously for a time, 
directing its fire specially against Fort Moultrie. About 
8 o'clock A.M., smoke was seen issuing from the quarters 
of Fort Sumter. Upon this the fire of our batteries was 
increased, as a matter of course, for the purpose of 
bringing the enemy to terms as speedily as possible, inas- 
much as his flag was still floating defiantly above him. 
Fort Sumter continued to fire from time to time, but at 
long and irregular intervals, amid the dense smoke, flying 
shot, and bursting shell. Our brave troops, carried away 
by their natural, generous impulses, mounted the differ- 
ent batteries, and at every discharge from the fort cheered 
the garrison for its pluck and gallantry, and hooted the 
fleet lying inactive just outside the bar. 

About 1.30 P.M., it being reported to me that the flag 
was down (it afterward appeared that the flag-staff had 
been shot away), and the conflagration, from the large 
volume of smoke being apparently on the increase, I sent 
three of my aids with a message to Maior Anderson to 



92 ADDENDA. 

the effect that, seeing his flag no longer flying, his quar- 
ters in flames, and supposing him to be in distress, I de- 
sired to offer him any assistance he might stand in need 
of. Before my aids reached the fort the United States 
flag was displayed on the parapet, but remained there 
only a short time when it was hauled down and a white 
flag substituted in its place. When the United States 
flag first disappeared, the firing from our batteries almost 
entirely ceased, but reopened with increased vigor when 
it reappeared on the parapet, and was continued until the 
white flag was raised, when it entirely ceased. Upon the 
arrival of my aids at Fort Sumter they delivered their 
message to Major Anderson, who replied that he thanked 
me for my offer, but desired no assistance. Just previous 
to their arrival Col. Wigfall, one of my aids, who had been 
detached for special duty on Morris Island, had, by order 
of Brigadier-Gen. Simons, crossed over to Fort Sumter 
from Cummings' Point, in an open boat, with private Gour- 
din Young, amidst a heavy fire of shot and shell, for the 
purpose of ascertaining from Major Anderson whether his 
intention was to surrender, his flag being down and his 
quarters in flames. On reaching the fort the colonel had 
an interview with Major Anderson, the result of which 
was that Major Anderson understood him as offering the 
same conditions on the part of General Beauregard as 
had been tendered him on the nth instant, while Colonel 
Wigfall's impression was that Major Anderson uncon- 
ditionally surrendered, trusting to the generosity of Gen- 
eral Beauregard to offer such terms as would be honor- 
able and acceptable to both parties. Meanwhile, before 
these circumstances were reported to me, and in fact as 
soon as the aids I had dispatched with offers of assist- 
ance had set out on their mission, hearing that a white 
flag was flying over the fort, I sent Major Jones, my 
chief-of-staff, and some other aids, with substantially the 



ADDENDA. 93 

same propositions I had submitted to Major Anderson on 
the nth inst., with the exception of the privilege of sa- 
luting his flag. The Major (Anderson) replied : " it would 
be exceedingly gratifying to him, as well as his command, 
to be permitted to salute their flag, having so gallantly 
defended the fort under such trying circumstances, and 
hoped that General Beauregard would not refuse it, as 
such privilege was not unusual." He further said he 
"would not urge the point, but would prefer to refer the 
matter to me." The point was, therefore, left open until 
the matter was submitted to me. Previous to the return 
of Major Jones, I sent a fire-engine, under Mr. M. H. 
Nathan, chief of the fire department, and Surgeon-Gen- 
eral Gibbes of South Carolina, with several of my aids, 
to offer further assistance to the garrison of Fort Sumter, 
which was declined. I very cheerfully agreed to allow 
the salute, as an honorable testimony to the gallantry and 
fortitude with which Major Anderson and his command 
had defended their fort, and I informed Major Anderson 
of my decision about 7^ o'clock, through Major Jones, my 
chief-of-staff. 

The arrangements being completed, Major Anderson 
embarked with his command on the transport prepared to 
convey him to the United States fleet lying outside the bar, 
and the troops immediately garrisoned the fort, and be- 
fore sunset the flag of the Confederate States floated over 
the ramparts of Fort Sumter. 

* * * * * * > 

I am, sir, very respectfully, 

Vour obedient servant, 

G. T. Beauregard, 

Brigadier-General Com'dg. 
Hon. L. p. Walker, 

Secretary of War, 
' The omitted part embraced only compliments to his command. 



APPENDIX. 



The Confederate leaders profiled by the lesson given by Major An- 
derson in his seizure of Sumter, by taking the forts within their 
borders, either before they passed their ordinance of secession or a few 
days after. In most instances Messrs. Floyd and Cooper had taken 
care that good reliable rebels were in command at important posts. 

A brief resume may be interesting as a reminiscence. 

Georgia passed its ordinance of secession January 19, 1861. 

Fort Pulaski was seized on January 3d ; Augusta Arsenal, January 
24th ; Oglethorp Barracks and Fort Jackson, on January 26th. 

Fort Pulaski was in charge of Captain Wm. H. C. Whiting, Capt. 
of U. S. Engineers, born in the State of Maine ; subsequently 
General Whiting, C. S. A., Chief Engineer in Charleston Harbor, 
and later on at Fort Fisher. 

Augusta Arsenal was garrisoned by Captain Elzey, 2d Artillery, 
and his company. Captain Elzey surrendered without firing a shot, 
and became General Elzey, C. S. A. 

It was also the painful duty of Captain Whiting to report the sur- 
render of Oglethorp Barracks and of Fort Jackson. 

An ordinance of secession was adopted in Mississippi on January 
9th, and in Alabama on January 11, 1861. 

The arsenal at Mount Vernon was seized by State troops January 
4th, and Forts Morgan and Gaines on the 5th. 

Governor Moore, of Alabama, wrote to his Excellency James 
Buchanan as follows : " Sir : In a spirit of frankness I hasten to in- 
form you by letter that, by my order, the above-named forts and ar- 
senal have been peacefully occupied and are now held by the troops 
of the State of Alabama. 

******** 

" I deem it my duty to take every precautionary step to make the 
secession of the State peaceful, and prevent detriment to my people. 
******** 

" The purpose with which my order was given, and has been exe- 
cuted, was to avoid and not to provoke hostilities between the State 
and Federal governments." (Page 327, "Confederate Correspond- 
ence.") And so on for quantity. 

Imagine the Fenians seizing Dublin Castle with these excuses. 

94 



APPENDIX. 95 

Florida voted on the ordinance of secession on January loth. 
The result could not have been known for a week, yet the arsenal at 
Apalachicola was seized on January 6th; Fort Marion, St. Augustine, 
January 7th; Barrancas Barracks, Forts Barrancas and McKee, and 
the Pensacola Navy Yard were seized, and the surrender of Fort 
Pickens was demanded, on the 12th. 

In the Confederate correspondence in relation to Florida, p. 348, 
st seq., there is some interesting reading. 

First we find a request of Senator Yulee to the Secretary of War, 
asking a list of anny officers from Florida, with rank and pay. The 
information was given by Secretary Floyd. Next we find a request 
of Yulee and Mallory for the number of U. S. troops in Florida, and 
the amount of arms and ammunition in all the forts and arsenals of the 
State. A paper giving the desired information in full was made out 
by the Ordnance Department. But on January 9th it suddenly oc- 
curred to Secretary of War Holt, that "the interests of the ser- 
vice forbid that the information which you ask should at this moment 
be made public." 

One fort and one arsenal had already been forcibly seized, a few 
days before, by the constituents of the Honorable Senators. 

The U. S. steamer Brooklyn arrived off Pensacola with reinforce- 
ments for Fort Pickens on February 6, 1861. 

These troops were kept on board the steamer by a secret under- 
standing with the rebels, called an informal truce, from that date to 
the I2th of April, when they were landed. 

On the 23d of January, 1861, a special messenger of the govern- 
ment. Lieutenant Saunders, was arrested as a prisoner of war at Pen- 
sacola. 

January 26th, Secretary Holt telegraphs General Scott : " The 
President is much disturbed by a telegraphic despatch which an- 
nounces that the Brooklyn has sailed with two companies instead of 
one as ordered." (Vol. I, p. 454, " Rebellion Record.") 

On the same page we have the explanation of the disturbance of 
the Executive intellect. 

" Pensacola, January 28, 1861. 
' ' To Hon. John Slidell, or, in his absence, Hon. R. W. Hunter, 
or Governor Bigler : 

" We hear the Brooklyn is coming with reinforcements for Fort 
Pickens. No attack on its garrison is contemplated, but, on the con- 
trary, we desire to keep the peace, and if the present status be pre- 
served we will guarantee that no attack will be made upon it, but if 
reinforcements be attempted, resistance and a bloody conflict seem 
inevitable. Should the government thus attempt to augment its force 
— when no possible call for it exists, when we are preserving a peace- 
ful policy — an assault may be made upon the fort at a moment's 
warning. All preparations are made. Our whole force — 1,700 
strong — will regard it as a hostile act. Impress this upon the Presi- 
dent, and urge that the inevitable consequence of reinforcement un- 



96 



APPENDIX. 



der present circumstances is instant war, as peace will be preserved if 
no reinforcements be attempted. If the President wants an assur- 
ance of all I say from Colonel Chase, commanding the forces, I will 
transmit it at once. I am determined to stave off war if possible. 
Answer promptly. 

"S. R. Mallory." 

It is evident that Slidell, Hunter, & Co. had anticipated Senator 

Mallory's suggestions. 

The despatch, which was sent by Lieut. Saunders to Commodore 

Armstrong, and which was taken from him by force, was in words 

and figures as follows : 

"Washington, January 7.% 1861. 

"To James Glynn, commanding the Macedonian; Capt. W. S. 
Walker, commanding the Brooklyn, and other naval officers in 
command ; and Lieut. Adam J. Slemmer, First Regiment Artil- 
lery, U. S. Army, commanding Fort Pickens, Pensacola, Fla. : 

" In consequence of the assurances received from Mr. Mallory in a 
telegram of yesterday to Messrs. Slidell, Hunter, and Bigler, with 
a request it should be laid before the President, that Fort Pickens 
would not be assaulted, and an offer of such an assurance to the same 
effect from Colonel Chase, for the purpose of avoiding a hostile col- 
lision, upon receiving satisfactory assurances from Mr. Mallory and 
Colonel Chase that Fort Pickens will not be attacked, you are in- 
structed not to land the company on board the Brooklyn unless said 
fort shall be attacked or preparations shall be made for its attack. 
The provisions necessary for the supply of the fort you will land. 
The Brooklyn and other vessels of war on the station will remain, 
and you will exercise the utmost vigilance and be prepared at a 
moment's warning to land the company at Fort Pickens, and you and 
they will instantly repel an attack on the fort. 

" The President yesterday sent a special message to Congress com- 
mending the Virginia resolution of compromise. The Commissioners 
of different States are to meet here on Monday, the 4th February, 
and it is important that during their session a collision of arms should 
be avoided, unless an attack should be made or there should be 
preparation for such an attack. In either event the Brooklyn and 
the other vessels will act promptly. 

" Your right, and that of the other officers in command at Pensacola, 
freely to communicate with the government by special messenger, 
and its right in the same manner to communicate with yourself and 
them, will remain intact as the basis on which the present instruction 
is given. 

"J. Holt, Secretary of War. 

" Isaac Toucey, Secretary of the Navy." 

This was the basis of the famous trace under which the Confeder- 
ates erected batteries all around Pickens, as they did about Sumter. 
It was on the 1st of April that General Scott signed the order 



APPENDIX, 97 

placing Bvt. Lieut. -Colonel Harvey Brown in command of the secret 
expedition for the relief of Fort Pickens, of which the Powhatan 
formed a part. 

The following extracts from General Meig's letter to General Tot- 
ten, p. 394, partly explain the Powhatan mystery : 

" The uncertainty of the government as to the condition of Fort 
Pickens, and as to the very orders and instructions under which the 
squadron off that fortress was acting, led to apprehensions lest the 
place might be taken before relief could reach it. 

" A landing in boats from the mainland on a stormy night was per- 
fectly practicable, in spite of the utmost efforts of a fleet anchored 
outside and off the bar to prevent it. Such a landing in force, taking 
possession of the low flank embrasures by men armed with revolvers, 
would be likely to sweep in a few minutes over the ramparts of Fort 
Pickens, defended by only forty soldiers and forty ordinary men from 
the navy yard, a force which did not allow one man to be kept at each 
flanking gun. 

" Believing that a ship-of-war could be got ready for sea and reach 
Pensacola before any expedition in force, I advised the sending of 
such a ship under a young and energetic commander, with orders to 
enter the harbor without stopping, and, once in, to prevent any boat 
expedition from the main to Santa Rosa. 

" Capt. David D. Porter readily undertook this dangerous duty, and, 
proceeding to New York, succeeded in fitting out the Powhatan, and 
sailed on the 6th for his destination. 

"On the morning of the 17th, while engaged in landing the horses, 
the Powhatan, which we had passed without seeing her during the 
voyage, hove in sight. A note from Colonel Brown advised me that 
in his opinion her entrance into the harbor at that time would bring 
on a collision, which it was very important to defer until our stores, 
guns, and ammunition were disposed of. 

"As the enemy did not seem inclined yet to molest us ; as with 600 
troops in the fort and three war steamers anchored close inshore, 
there was no danger of a successful attempt at a landing by the 
enemy, it was evident that it was important to prevent a collision, 
and her entrance would have uselessly exposed a gallant officer and a 
devoted crew to extreme dangers. 

" The circumstances had changed since Captain Porter's orders had 
been issued by the President. Knowing the imperative nature of 
these orders, and the character of him who bore them, I feared that 
it would not be possible to arrest his course ; but requesting the com- 
mander of the Wyandotte, on board of which I fortunately found my- 
self at the time I received Colonel Brown's letter, to get under way 
and place his vessel across the path of the Powhatan, making signal 
that I wished to speak with him, I succeeded at length, in spite of his 
changes of course and his disregard of our signals, in stopping this 
vessel, which steered direct for the perilous channel on which 
frowned the guns of McKee, Barrancas, and many newly constructed 
batteries. 



98 APPENDIX. 

" I handed to Captain Porter Colonel Brown's letter, indorsed upon 
it my hearty concurrence in its advice, which, under his authority from 
the Executive, had the force of an order from the President himself, 
and brought the Powhatan to anchor near the Atlantic, in position to 
sweep with her guns the landing-place and its communications. 

"The Brooklyn shortly afterward anchored east of ths Atlantic, 
and the Wyandotte took up position near her." 

But why first assign the Powhatan, first assigned to the Sumter ex- 
pedition, and then transferred without the knowledge of either the 
Secretaries of War or the Navy ? 

We extract a few interesting extracts from the " Confederate Cor- 
respondence," p. 443, etseq. : 

" I shall give the enemy a shot next week before retiring (from the 
U. S. Senate). I say enemy ! Yes, I am theirs, and they are mine. 
I am willing to be their masters, but not their brothers. 

" Yours, in haste, 

"D. L. YULEE." 

(Oh, shade of Lindley Murray hover o'er us !) 

"Washington, January'}, i86i. 
"Joseph Finegan, Esq. (Tallahassee, Fla.): 

" My Dear Sir : On the other side (following) is a copy of reso- 
lutions adopted at a consultation of the Senators from the seceding 
States, in which Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana, Arkansas, Texas, Mis- 
sissippi, and Florida were present. 

' ' The idea of the meeting was that the States should go out at once, 
and provide for an early organization of a Confederate government, 
not later than 15th February. This time is allowed to enable Louisi- 
ana and Texas to participate. It seemed to be the opinion that if we 
left here, force, loan, and volunteer bills might be passed, which 
would put Mr. Lincoln in immediate condition for hostilities ; where- 
as, by remaining in our places until the 4th March, it is thought we 
can keep the hands of Mr. Buchanan tied, and disable the Republicans 
from effecting any legislation which will strengthen the hands of the 
incoming Administration. 

* * *.* * 4: « « 

" In haste, yours truly, 

" D. L. YULEE." 

How secret the Pensacola expedition was may be seen from the 
following despatches ; 

"Augusta, March 20, 1861. 
" President Davis: 

"My always reliable Washington correspondent says: 'Evident 
Lincoln intends to reinforce Pickens.' 

"Wm. H. Pritchard." 



APPENDIX. 99 

"War Department, A. and I. G. O. 

" Montgomery, yi;)n7 6, 1861, 

"Brig.-Gen. Braxton Bragg: 

" The government at Washington have determined to reinforce Fort 
Pickens, and troops are now leaving for that purpose. 

*' S. Cooper, 
"Adjutant and Inspector-General." 

North Carolina seceded May 20th. Forts Caswell and Johnston 
were seized April i6th. The arsenal at Fayetteville was surrendered 
by Capt. S. S. Anderson, U. S. A., subsequently C. S. A., April 
22d. He had forty-two men, but made no resistance. 

Louisiana seceded on January 26th. The U. S. arsenal and bar- 
racks at Baton Rouge were seized, January lOth ; Forts Jackson and 
Saint Philip, January nth; Fort Pike, January 14 ; Fort Macon, Jan- 
uary 28th. Paymaster's funds and ail government property were soon 
after taken in New Orleans. 

The form of the demand was the same in all cases. To wit : " In 
the name of the Sovereign State of Louisiana, I now demand," etc., 
etc. 

The ordinance of secession was adopted by the Arkansas Conven- 
tion, May 6th ; all the U. S. forts and property within the borders of 
that State and the Indian Territory were seized before the secession 
of Arkansas. 

In Texas no hostile demonstrations were made against the U. S. 
Government until after the passage of the ordinance of secession, 
February i, 1861. 

There is only one thing important to note in connection with our 
subject, and that is, that although General Twiggs, commanding that 
Department, commenced writing for instructions as early as Decem- 
ber 13, i860, and wrote urgently over and over again, he only re- 
ceived one non-committal letter from General Scott's Aid. 

It was evident from the time of his first letter that he did not in- 
tend to support the government in coercive measures. In subsequent 
letters he said that he intended only to be a looker-on, and that he 
never would fire on an American citizen. 

Before the passage of the ordinance of secession Twiggs would 
probably have collected the troops under his command and marched 
them to any place the government might have designated. 

If, on the other hand, the government wished to hold Texas by 
force, the troops should of course have been placed under the com- 
mand of some able and loyal officer, and concentrated at the State 
capital. 

As it was, Twiggs was relieved by Col. Waile, February 19, 1861. 

The first letter of instructions to Col. Waite is a military curiosity: 



lOO APPENDIX. 

* HEAD-QUARTERS OF THE ARMY, 

" Washington, Febrtmry 4, 1861. 

" Col. C. A. Waite, U. S. Army, 

" Commanding Departtnent of Texas, San Antonio : 

' ' Sir. — The General-in-Chief directs me to write you as follows : 
To relieve Brevet Major-General Twiggs, you were put in orders the 
28th ultimo to command, according to your brevet rank, the Depart- 
ment of Texas. Instructions followed three days later for sending 
the five companies of artillery on the Rio Grande to Brazos Santiago, 
there to be embarked in a steamer (ordered hence to meet them), 
with their batteries complete, leaving their horses, for sale or other 
service, behind. If necessary, the artillery companies will be re- 
placed by detachments of infantry, unless Texas should in the mean- 
time have declared herself out of the Union. 

" In the latter case you will wait for instructions respecting the dis- 
position of the troops (other than the artillery) under your command 
and the public property in their hands, which you will hold and pre- 
serve. 

" I am, etc., 

"L. Thomas." 

This letter was written not by the traitor Floyd but by the patriot 
Holt ; not under the administration of poor Pierce, but under that 
of the veteran statesman, James Buchanan. 

A department commander is told that instructions will only be 
sent him as to his arm of strength a/ier the State in which he is com- 
manding may have seceded. 

This letter was sent at a time when the government had learned to 
its sorrow that secession meant open defiance, spoliation, or war. 

" Angels and ministers of grace defend us!" 



